Trains and Sewing Machines
by Chassant
Summary: Somewhere in the distance, a train blew its whistle. He made the puppets dance. When you're dying, hope is all that's left. Zemyx, AU. Formerly titled 'Candystriper.'
1. Prologue

So, this is my first Zemyx fic, and my first AU fic for Kingdom Hearts. It's brand new to me, but I hope you'll stick with me and maybe give this story a chance......I can assure you this is just a short prologue, and the remaining chapters (I don't have a count yet) will be longer. ^_^ Thanks for reading. I'll make sure to respond to any reviews recieved, even flames (ouch). Constructive criticsm is appreciated.

333

* * *

_Why do you like the water so much? _

_**Because I want to be somewhere else. The ocean will take me somewhere else. It will carry my weight, sing me to sleep. I imagine that...after, it will.....just be the ocean. Taking me somewhere else. **_

_You have such hope. _

_**When you're dying, hope is all that's left. **_


	2. Day One

Allo allo ~ Wave~ The first order of business is to give a thousand thanks and mad props to my beta, **VersaceFrolic.** Without her this thing would ave died in my mind and gotten buried on my computer somewhere ^.%. The second order of business is to thank you for clicking, and I hope you really enjoy! And of course, you can click one more time to review, review, review....constructive criticism is appreciated! Thanks again, and I hope you like the story.

* * *

** ~ Flawless (An Introduction to Apathy) ~**

* * *

In the fourth grade, Zexion dropped his cat, Fido, off the fifth story of his apartment complex to see if it would land on its feet.

Fido quickly ceased to be a living being and soon became a mess of bone and bloody fur. Zexion had felt no remorse, only a faint interest, but he cried so convincingly, telling his mother that the cat had slipped and fallen, that he had avoided getting in trouble altogether.

In the eighth grade, he knocked a fellow classmate unconscious and persuaded him to tell the authorities he had thrown the first punch.

A year later, he slept with a girl for the first time when he convinced her that he loved her. Finding the experience distasteful and unpleasant in every way, he had promptly broken up with her. She had not hated him for it. Instead, she had apologized.

Zexion had a talent.

He spoke his lines clearly with whichever emotion the situation called for - every breath, pause, syllable, stress, every word measured and drawn out perfectly to achieve whatever end he desired. He spun words as easily as a spider spins its silk web, and he could make people believe whatever he wanted them to believe.

* * *

Just four months short of his eighteenth birthday, he'd stood in front of a judge and was sentenced to a month of court selected community service. It was only his way with words that kept him from prison, and the judge was almost sympathetic, but the crime could not go unpunished. "You're lucky," Judge Benson had said. "that you didn't kill anybody, young man."

Zexion wasn't sure whether or not he was 'lucky.'Other people were a waste of time and space, possessing no intrinsic value; they were only useful as means to an end. Though he had his own social circle, he considered himself without friends. Those he allowed around him were merely tolerable companions who happened to suit his needs. He was grateful he hadn't killed any of them solely because he wasn't sure that even _he_ could talk himself out of that one.  
Naturally, he hadn't voiced his thoughts. Instead, he had tilted his head up to look at the judge, made his eyes water just short of crying, and spouted a long winded monologue about human life and how special it was, how he regretted his mistake, etc., etc.

That monologue had saved him from thirty days in juvenile detention, but now he was a fucking _candy striper_. He foresaw weeks of moving from room to room, wearing a perfectly contrived smile, handing out mail and meals to the elderly—and making them believe that he _liked _it. Liked _them_. He supposed he should be grateful for the lack of a hideous pink uniform, grateful that he wasn't made to dye his hair a normal, safe color, grateful that he wasn't picking trash up off the road. But white was not his color, and perhaps this was worse; trash might have been better than interaction with _people_. Sick, dying, people.

His already pale complexion made to seem a few shades lighter by his customary black clothing, he was quite aware that often he looked sick himself. Strangers shot him looks constantly—although it occurred to Zexion that most people, even those who considered himself his friends, were strangers to him. They knew nothing about him. It wasn't their right to know who he was, and he didn't need them to know. It was enough that _he_ knew who he was.

Or, so he thought.

He was perfectly aware of his positive qualities. He knew he was intelligent—he had a high school diploma and several test scores to speak for the fact. With nothing but a scanner, a printer, and a machine for laminating, he knew how to create false documents. It had earned him his fair share of money in his short lifetime, and granted him to admittance to many places he was not at all supposed to be. He was beautiful—school had been sickening for him, with a population of two thousand students crowding the halls, and the girls, despite the rumors they had heard, seemed to go out of their way to touch him. Like moths to a candle flame, they were drawn to someone as hard and apparently as flawless as a diamond.

Of course, even diamonds were flawed. This fact was not lost on Zexion.

He could not feel. If ever he had let anybody see inside his shelled out heart, they would very likely see this as a glaring character flaw. Personally, he counted it among one of his most beneficial attributes. How could he ever get what he wanted if he cared what others _felt_?

He had never cared before, and he wasn't going to care now. But he would walk through it the way he walked through the rest of his life. He would pretend.

* * *

Chicago in the winter was disgustingly cold, and altogether just disgusting. Snow was a rare commodity—it was consistently just sleet, and the ice patches on the road made driving impossible. Scowling, Zexion realized that it wasn't of importance to him anymore, as his license had been revoked. So at two oclock on the Wednesday after his sentencing, he found himself climbing into Larxene's sleek red car for a ride to Castle Memorial Hospital.

Larxene's purpose in his life was to split his rent with him and, currently, to drive him wherever he might need to go.

Of their social circle, Larxene was the only one he allowed to be in such close proximity to him. She was the only one whose company he found slightly more than tolerable. Nineteen years old, she had a spitfire, manic kind of attitude and a libido to match. Zexion was the only male in her life she had never slept with and yet was decidedly pleasant to. He was sure she had the same view on humanity as he did, although perhaps a little more actively abusive, if the leather whips and handcuffs she kept around the house were any indicator.

Occasionally he would wake in the middle of the night and lay up listening to the moans and screams coming from her room down the hall. They did not arouse him. He had no sexual drive.

Of course, in high school, there were those who tried, male and female alike. They sidled up beside him, talked to him although he was unresponsive. Touched his arms, his back; in their eyes he was a conquest. And it was ridiculously simple to use them! All he had to do was smile the right way, say the right words. Act a little friendly, and they kissed the ground he walked on as if he were a god. They would do anything he asked.

Larxene was far from a conquest. She seemed to spread her legs for anything that batted their eyes at her the right way. Perhaps for that reason, or perhaps it was because of her strange mental malfunction, she was the only one who was immune to his charms. She never bent to his will, and after whole year of trying—from sixth grade to seventh grade—he gave up on it. There were others. But she stuck around him nonetheless, and some tentative form of friendship was formed.

"You're lucky I owe you, you little bastard," Larxene said, only half kidding as she let him out at the front entrance.

* * *

Zexion had only been in the hospital once before, when he had carelessly slipped on a patch of ice and broken his ankle shortly after his distasteful experience with Naminé in their freshman year. He hated it now as much as he had hated it then, if not more. The antiseptic smell, the whitewashed walls suggesting purity like a fairytale; it was a place where every minute detail was under surveillance and control, while he himself was helpless to all of it. Everything under control, but he controlled nothing.

The crisp white uniform was starched, ironed, and hung up when he arrived, and he was greeted by a petite girl with short auburn hair who introduced herself, far too cheerily for Zexion's taste, as Kairi. She looked to be the kind of girl who would have been _thrilled_ with a hideous pink uniform.

The training room was just as bleak as the rest of the place, tucked into the back of the first floor, windowless and walled in concrete. There were two other trainees, only one—a short brunette kid—of whom looked even a little pleased to be there. Moving with the grace of a drunken elephant, the brunette bounced up to Zexion.

"I'm Sora!" The kid said, shooting the sort of look at Kairi that made his stomach turn. A look of love, but perhaps even beyond that, as if she were the Sun and he was just the stupid little Earth. It occurred to Zexion that this 'Sora' probably wasn't any happier to be there than he was, but he had to act even behind the scenes.

Kairi rolled in a television set and an ancient VCR. She turned off the lights.

The machine whirred and hissed and ground. While the video struggled to come to life, Zexion struggled to push down the panic rising in his chest. The small space seemed suddenly like a concrete tomb closing in on him.

Then, mercifully, an image flickered across the screen and cast pale light over the room.

The video itself was asinine and pointless. He did not need to watch a ten minute segment on how to hand out _mail _or read a book. He thought anyone so incompetent should not be allowed to be treated at the hospital, much less work there.

* * *

A trail of white smoke curled up towards the grey sky. Zexion sat outside the hospital, wetness from the curb soaking through the seat of his ripped jeans. He had never been so grateful for his own clothes in his life.

His first day had been impossibly dull, and Sora and Kairi had constantly and possibly intentionally danced on his last nerve. The other boy, a blonde kid just slightly shorter than Zexion, looked even less pleased to be there than he was, if that was at all possible. His nametag read 'Roxas', but the boy never volunteered that information.

His lips felt stretched out from the perpetual smile he wore for the elderly patients; he had lied as perfectly as always. He had been partnered with Roxas, who was quiet and cold, whose face looked distorted when he tried the same smile. Roxas could not lie like Zexion could lie. But he was quiet, much more tolerable than either of the others.

Larxene's car was easily identifiable as it pulled into the parking lot, a splash of color against the grey backdrop. She'd only agreed to be his chauffeur for the next three months because, as she'd said, she owed him—he had done her a favor about six months previously, only, of course, with the expectation that one day he would need one in return.

When one of her little sex toys had stubbornly refused to leave her alone, Zexion had gone to his house and explained to him, very calmly, what body parts he would be missing if he tried to contact her one more time. Looking appalled, the man had slammed the door in his face. But he hadn't called Larxene again.

So she owed him.

He climbed in the car.

"Would you put that out? You know I don't like smoking in my car."

"You smoke in the car every day."

"Well, that's me. And I'm different."

Just to be insufferable, he blew a cloud of smoke in her face, but flicked the cigarette butt out the window. It hissed as it landed in a puddle just a foot away.

She dropped him off at the small café where he worked evening shifts, six until closing at midnight. It wasn't bad comparatively; the traffic wasn't heavy, just a few stragglers coming in for coffee.

Some of them would sit close to the windows and read by the light of the setting sun. Very new age, very hip. Sometimes he wondered if they actually absorbed the words on the page, or if it was a matter of appearances. The music was soft, not enough to bother him. He worked alone.

There wasn't anything much different about that particular night. He drank his coffee—a mocha latté—and read his dog-eared copy of _One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest_, only looking up when the small bell above the door chimed softly, signaling another customer.

When his shift was over, he closed up the shop, wiping down the table, turning off the lights. The streetlight sifting in through the window made it possible for him to exit the store without having a panic attack, just as they made it possible for him to be outside at night.

At 12:13, Zexion began to edge his way home through the wet, cold slush, certain that Larxene was otherwise occupied. He was not dependent on her. He had two legs that he could walk on, and he'd be damned if he wasn't going to do it then, even with only a thin black windbreaker to protect against the biting cold.

He arrived back at their flat at 12:37 and found that he had been right about Larxene. It was impossible to ignore the sound coming out of her room, but he was so accustomed to it that it hardly bothered him. He opened the fridge, poured himself a tall vodka and cranberry, and retreated into his room.

* * *

_The dark. The night is when it starts. When the sun sinks down over the horizon in the west, his father pours a tall glass of bourbon. The liquid smells repulsive and once Zexion steals a sip of it, almost gags and loses his lunch, but keeps it down. It's disgusting and it seems to catch his insides on fire. He doesn't understand his father. _

_Or his mother, for that matter. _

_At nine o'clock she tucks her son into bed, his small body snuggling comfortably under the covers, with a perfect, fake smile on her face that he can read through easily. As if she doesn't know what's coming, which she does. As if he doesn't know. But he knows. He sees the way she's almost chomping at the bit, ready, ready, ready. Ready for the fight. Like she lives for it. Like a boxer or a wrestler. Masochist or sadist? Six year old Zexion isn't aware of these words, but he knows instinctively she must be one or both. _

_He sees her perfectly manicured nails resting on the light switch just before she flips it. Knows that they will be splintered and broken by morning. She'll redo them quickly. Must keep up appearances. She must always keep up appearances._

_In the total darkness, he hears it start. Shrieking, snarling. The shatter of glass, splintered like his mother's fake nails. Pictures fall off the wall; they can never seem to keep pictures around the house. He hears his father yelling. Slut. Bitch. Whore. _

_And his mother yells back. Bastard. Prick. Jackass. _

_She slams into the wall. She shrieks, Zexion can picture those claw-like hands lashing forward, digging ruts through his father's chest or shoulder or face. The skin crawling up under her nails. Pushing the limits of acrylic until it can take no more. This is when it breaks. Shatters like the glass, like the picture frames. Like his life. Sticks and stones may break their bones, but words will never— _

_Hurt. He swallows thickly, as if he could swallow the pain, ingest it and then digest it and then pass it through, flushed through the pipe system and never thought of again. _

_In public none of this exists. In front of him, in the bright hours of day, they smile. The perfect couple, with their white picket fence, their adorable, 'genius' son, their cat named Fido because the son is allergic to dogs. They are better than diamond, because they are flawless. _

* * *

Zexion jerked, and, as if in a reflex reaction, sent his glass flying across the room. The sound of it breaking against the concrete wall above his dresser made him recoil. Red liquid, thinner than blood, spilled over the oak top and dripped onto the carpet.

He jumped out of bed quickly and rushed to the pile of neatly folded (dirty) laundry in the corner. He grabbed a filthy towel and pressed it over the wet spot. He wanted to suffocate the stain before it set. But more than that, he wanted to suffocate the memory inside of him.

He wanted to push it down like he pushed every thing else down, every stupid insignificant thing that made him human. He wished he had been born heartless. He could not feel because he forced himself not to. He learned the lesson young—if you do not feel, you do not hurt. The puppeteer does not feel sympathy or remorse for all his Pinocchios. He makes them dance, dance, and his parents were always struggling for—

Zexion pressed the towel harder into the spill.

The bulb inside his red lava lamp flickered and went out. Total darkness. The panic came quickly and he sank completely to the floor. He struggled for his breath. Push it down, push it down. Push down the panic. Fight it. It's a stupid, silly, childish fear. Fight it, he told himself. Arguing with himself. Trying to breathe, even though asphyxiation would almost certainly mean peace.

When he woke up in the morning with the imprint of the towel on the left side of his face, his typically perfect hair sticking up like goose down, heavy black bags beneath his eyes, he knew that it was going to be a difficult day.


	3. Day Two

* * *

**~Meeting (The Grinding Machine)~**

Zexion sat on a bench in Millennium Park, plagued with a headache that threatened to split him open. Chicago was a grinding machine and the noise made it worse; even the weak winter sun would have pushed him over the edge, and he was at least thankful for the thick haze of smog that covered it's brightness. He had asked Larxene to drop him off early a little distance away from the hospital, as he found even her presence to be unbearable that morning. He didn't know how he was going to survive his second day candy striping. At least Kairi and Sora would be in school – he tried to keep that thought in the forefront.

He checked his watch, stomped out his cigarette and stood up to walk the remaining two blocks to the hospital. The night before had been rough, filled with panic, but he had pushed it down and back. Now, he was as he always was. Cold as the sleet and snow, thinking of ways to pull the strings in his favor.

* * *

At the hospital he was greeted by a middle aged woman, the head of staff, and assaulted with a sack of envelopes, mail for the patients. Most of them were elderly, and the mail was more than likely from their children and grandchildren. Crayon marks on roughly thirty percent of the envelopes was sufficient evidence for the latter. He fought back a scowl. Loving families did not exist, and only the children young enough to scrawl on Grandma's mail were naive enough to believe it was so.

Although, he was sure that the brat pack – as he'd come to think of Kairi and Sora – would disagree thoroughly. Sora struck him as the type who still scribbled with crayons. His little girlfriend probably thought it was cute.

So Zexion went through the first two hours of his shift passing out the mail, smiling at the patients, promising that he would see them later. 'Such a lovely young man.' One woman commented, grasping his hand. He smiled in the mimicry of sweetness, but of course it was truly because he realized he still had _it_. He could still pull the strings even in a place like this.

* * *

He hated the hospital's bright lights, which were presently worsening his headache, and he hated darkness. Where was the middle? He supposed it was the café, softly lit, the headlights from passing cars occasionally sweeping through the window. As he walked down the halls, he found himself wishing to be there instead of at the hospital. The sterile smell had come to be synonymous with the smell of death. He saw death in the faces of many of the patients, and fear. The fear disgusted him. What was there to be afraid of? One day you were walking on this earth and the next you were nothingness. Nothingness should not be feared. It was his God.

The neutrality of apathy, no emotion made it possible to function and achieve his ends. The void of death made it possible to move along and know that one day there would be nothing, no needs or wants. Why pull strings then? Why make the puppets dance? Nothing he would ever require again. It might be dark, but he knew after death the dark wouldn't bother him. No panic. Blessed silence. Rest in peace.

He would not pull the trigger himself, although he had considered it before. He knew he was too narcissistic. Too egotistical. At the bottom line, too cowardly.

Demyx somehow was different.

Zexion met Demyx at the end of the route, his first encounter with the man's character being nothing but the last envelope in the sack. Simple, effeminate handwriting reading _Demyx Myede, room 669_. Not a wife or a child reaching this patient. No personal touch, nothing. He slipped into the elevator and pressed the button for the sixth floor, then made his way to room sixty nine.

The first thing he noticed was not the patient in the bed, but the room itself. There were no balloons or flowers attached to the bed railing or sitting on the desk, although it was obviously set up for a permanent stay. There was a television fixed to the wall but it was not on. Instead, the patient was staring out the window, which overlooked Lakeshore Drive and the rich blue water beyond it.

He liked the room because the window provided gentle lighting. It eased the aching in his temples slightly.

"You have mail." Zexion said, after looking at the lake for a moment. He spread his lips into the best smile he could, a sweet smile, a warm smile. The patient seemed to be slightly shocked for a moment and did not turn around, but when he did, Zexion had to fight to hold his expression.

Demyx Myede was quite obviously a dying man, and quite obviously undaunted by it.

It reminded him of the pictures of AIDS patients he had seen in Sex Ed, when he was in school. Demyx was pale and thin enough that Zexion was sure he could see the outline of his ribs against the hospital gown. There were lesions and bruises on his skin.

He thought he felt the twinge of something in his chest, something like shock, perhaps, but he hadn't felt shock in so long that he wasn't sure. This patient was not a _man_, or if he was, it was only barely. Eighteen. Nineteen or twenty, if Zexion was shooting high. He was young, and he was dying.

Yet the smile on his face was wide and genuine. There was no fear in his eyes.

Zexion handed him the envelope and felt a sudden urge to run out of the room, but he kept his own smile, stayed in place.

"You look like you'd rather be hanged." Demyx said, still grinning. "It's not contagious."

"I'm not an imbecile." He snapped back, then realized he was still 'working'. "I apologize, that was out of line."

The blonde waved it off.  
"I look forward to seeing you again, Demyx."

"No, you don't." And he was still smiling! "But that's alright. One day, you will."

* * *

Millennium Park again. Thirty minutes after midnight, the stars fighting to shine through the smog haze, their weak glimmer reflecting on the snow that had fallen. Zexion sat on a park bench. The café had been slightly busy that night, just busy enough to keep him from thinking, and when it had died down, he'd had the antics of Randall McMurphy to distract him.

He had decided to walk home again. If he avoided using Larxene as much as possible, she'd be much more open to doing him favors later on – although she did owe him. Still, he preferred to stay on her good side whenever possible, not out of the sick fear which most men seemed to harbor towards her or out of friendship, but simply because it was beneficial if she didn't feel like spitting nails at him.

He'd found that he wasn't ready to go home yet and listen to the screams of her most recent plaything, and so he'd gone to the park again. It was so quiet there, so still. There was nothing to distract him from his thoughts, which was certainly not a good thing, but he wanted to sit down. And he did what he wanted.

What he'd been trying to push from his mind was not a thing but a person: it was Demyx, and strange because he had only met him briefly, just a moment or two in a permanent hospital room over an impersonal envelope, but it had stuck with Zexion. It seemed to be frozen in his mind. He had not faltered, but someone had caught him. He knew he hadn't made a mistake, yet somehow this AIDS patient, this dying boy, had seen through him.

_You look as if you'd rather be hanged_. _It's not contagious_.

_No, you don't. But that's alright. One day, you will_.

Twenty one words was all it took to strip his world of everything he had believed to be true. That he could manipulate anybody. That he could lie to anybody. Even Larxene couldn't tell if he was lying…she only had some sort of strange immunity to the charm that made everyone else dance accordingly.

He hoped that Demyx had only thought he was hesitant because of the AIDS, because he had never been around someone so sick and didn't know how to act. That he had read through an emotion that did exist – his hesitance, his discomfort – for a reason that didn't. Because if that was the case, Demyx held no power over him.

If it wasn't, then he had a problem.

He laughed to himself softly. Obviously, he was over thinking this, stressing too much. The chances of him ever seeing Demyx Myede again were very low, and even if this boy did have something on him, it wouldn't matter. The most he would have to do was hand him an envelope.

Somewhere in the distance, a train blew it's whistle. Zexion tipped his head back to stare at the sky. He thought that it would be nice to scramble up onto one of those train cars and let them take him somewhere else; anywhere else, he didn't care where. As long as it was in a land far, far away. He could leap off in some other town, maybe even another state, where nobody would know him. He could start over again and pull the strings a different way.

How in the hell, he asked himself, did he get here?

Of course, he knew. He was exactly where he was because his parents could shut up long enough to parent, because even _he _did not have the patience to wait until he was eighteen to leave. He was exactly where he was because he liked to drink too much and thought he could get away with anything, even when those red and blue lights flashed through his car, which now sat in the parking lot gathering snow because he couldn't drive it anymore.

He supposed he could. He had false identification that would pass through any scan they might have. But…perhaps it was better to play it safe at the moment. Candy striping was bad enough. Jail would be worse.

* * *

The next thing he was aware of was Larxene's face, staring at him intently. "You little shit." She said.

"Uh…." He sat up, running a hand through his hair. Had he fallen asleep at the park? "What time is it?"

"It's three in the morning. Bars closed an hour ago, thought you'd be home."

"I stopped here after work. I must have fallen asleep."

"Whatever." She rolled her eyes. "Get in the car."

Still slightly groggy, he followed after her. When he climbed in the car, he realized they were not alone.

"There's a man handcuffed to your seat."

"Oh, that's just Marluxia." She said cheekily. "Ignore him."

Zexion spent the rest of the ride home trying to hold his breath as much as possible. The car smelled heavily like sex, and it was disgusting. It made him feel nauseous. He tried not to focus on the murmurs Larxene and her toy were trading, the way they were looking at each other. He didn't know if the smell was worse or those terrible, intimate glances.

At the apartment he slipped into his room as quickly as possible. He hurried inside even before Larxene was finished uncuffing the man in the car, and he was certain he would be hearing their shrieks and moans for the rest of the night. He fixed himself a drink – vodka and cranberry, as per usual – and shot into his room just as the couple was coming in the door.

He had fallen asleep on a park bench thinking about trains, and on that park bench he found himself miraculously saved from dreams; however, he would not repeat the incident in the interest of his dignity and his image. As he settled into his own bed he questioned whether he should go to sleep again, or whether he could. He supposed he could at least finish his drink first and that should help.

He turned fitfully in his bed. He couldn't tell if he was too warm, too cold, or none of the above. _Something_ kept him from being comfortable. He kicked off the sheets. Pulled them on again. Stuck one leg awkwardly outside them. He curled up, then stretched out. He laid on his back, stomach, and both sides.

The true problem was internal: his racing mind. Yet he wouldn't acknowledge the thoughts that he had. He slept most nights – and nobody said anything about sleeping well – because he dealt with his mind the same way he dealt with anything else. He couldn't lie to himself. So instead, he ran away.

The memory of the train whistle echoed in his head. The cowardice that kept him from pulling the trigger on himself also kept him from running after that train, kept him from going somewhere else to start fresh. He had that same compulsion that all humans have: the desire to stay safe, to stick to what they know. He knew how to live and he knew how to be where he was. He despised human nature, and yet it was his nature as well. It was a vicious cycle. The wheel turned, grinding like the great city around him, trapping him in place. What was he but a little car stuck in the mud? He desired to be like those great trains he fantasized about, plowing through anything that stood in their way.

And yet, while he desired not to feel at all, while he hated feeling, he realized that desire and hate are feelings themselves.

The wheel turned.

* * *

As the first light of dawn began to taint the sky, Zexion's cellphone vibrated and rang, trilling a monochromatic tone through the still silence of the room. Larxene and whoever-he-was had finally tired; he had just slipped into a deep sleep when his phone woke him. Disgruntled, he pushed the covers off of him and sat up, reaching for the offending article.

"Good morning, Zexion!"

He groaned. Kairi. Kairi of the brat pack. How in the hell had she gotten his number? Shouldn't she be getting ready for school?

"Good morning, Kairi." He responded, masking his distaste expertly. "How can I help you?"

"Did I wake you?"

"No" He lied. "I was just getting up."

"Oh, well. You need to bring a book with you to the hospital today. We're reading to patients!"

He blinked the sleep from his eyes and looked at his bookshelf. He ran his eyes along the spines; he didn't see much that would be acceptable to read to the old and dying. Old beat poetry and books filled with obscenties, deep insights on the human nature, and an excessive amount of drug use.

"Is Shakespeare alright?"

"Yeah! That's fine! I'll see you in…." There was a brief pause. "Five hours."

"School?"

"It's break."

It was going to be a very long, very painful two weeks in candystriping hell.


	4. Day Three

The first order of business here is to thank everyone for all of the wonderful reviews I've received! I swear I'll get around to responding to them personally. One day~! ^_^ And of course, all the the thanks in the world to my beta for tying up all the loose ends. I hope you all enjoy the lastest chapter, and remember, _review, review, review. _It's so greatly appreciated.

* * *

**~Toxic (Three Weeks to Live)~ **

* * *

Zexion stared at the door, disbelieving. This was the art of irony in practice, or perhaps this was retribution for trying to comfort himself the night before – as if falling asleep pon a park bench hadn't been enough. He had thought he would never have to see Demyx Myde again, and now he had found out that he would have to see him five days of the week for exactly thirty minutes each time. He supposed the best thing to do would be to slip in, read his passages, and take his leave, watching the clock constantly.

He pushed open the door and went in, clutching Shakespeare's anthology to his side perhaps a little too tightly. Again, it struck him that this room was set up for a permanent stay; Demyx wasn't going to check out. He wasn't going to leave this room alive, and apparently everyone who loved him knew it, had given up on wishing him well.

He took a deep breath and pushed open the door to room 669. The room set up for a permanent stay.

Demyx would die in this room, wouldn't he? Zexion shook his head. He wasn't different from any other patient. He was going to die. Everybody was going to die.

Demyx was just reaching the finish line a little earlier than the rest of them.

Just as before, the television screen was black, and Demyx was staring out at the lake.

When Zexion came in, the boy turned his head to look at him. "Hey," he said with what might have been just a little too much enthusiasm for Zexion to match, a smile spreading across his chapped lips.

Zexion returned the smile despite his uneasiness. He would have expected such a reaction from the patients he interacted with regularly, but not from this one. They'd only met once. "Hello, Demyx. I'm here to read to you. Is Shakespeare alright?" he asked, trying to keep his voice nonchalant. He would have to put on his best act today. Make sure this boy couldn't see through him. It was a challenge, and despite his almost schizophrenic sleep the night before, he felt ready.

"Oh, sure. I love Shakespeare, but I can't read it too well."

"Do you like books, then?"

"Sure." He shrugged, his smile turning to a sheepish kind of grin. "I just can't read them, really."

Though it explained why exactly he had to read to an eighteen year old boy, it opened up a world of questions that he thought it might be better left unasked. He pulled a chair up beside the bed and opened the anthology to _As You Like It_. Of course, it was a comedy. The plot was rich, and while it had never been one of his favorites, he thought that the patients might enjoy it.

"As I remember, Adam" he began to read "it was upon this fashion bequeathed to—"

"Hey, could you read 'Hamlet,' instead?" Demyx interrupted. "I don't wanna be rude, you know, it's just that… I like it a lot. A—friend of mine used to read it to me when we were younger. I mean, I just really like the hard stuff. You ever read 'A Clockwork Orange?'"

"Only about a thousand times."

"Well, I like deep stuff like that. So, if it's not too much trouble, do you think you could read me 'Hamlet?'"

"Isn't that—"

"Depressing? Nah. I can't go flinching every time someone says the 'd' word. And by the 'd' word, I mean death. Besides, who says I'm gonna die?"

Zexion's uneasiness multiplied tenfold. Was this patient really so unaware of what was happening to him? "I—"

"Relax." Demyx laughed, seeming to get a thrill from the other's anxiety. "I know I'm dying. They told me. I've got three weeks to live. I've been waiting for that news since I was fourteen. Maybe it's just better." He shrugged as if he didn't really care. Maybe he didn't.

Zexion, at a loss for words, flipped the book to the opening act of _The Tragedy of Hamlet, the Prince of Denmark_. And he began to read.

* * *

Staring out at the window of the café, Zexion watched headlights sweep across his field of vision, the book in his hand practically ignored. He never had enough of the words pouring into his mind, but now—he just couldn't focus on it. Apparently exposure to Demyx temporarily disabled his ability to think like a normal human being.

Three weeks. Just three more weeks of seeing the man. Strangely, there was no comfort in the fact that Demyx would be leaving his world in twenty-one days, or less if luck didn't serve him well. In a way, when he thought of it, it seemed like a light going out. He himself deserved to leave the world, he'd even be happy to. Demyx seemed to be living his life through to the fullest, even knowing that it was going to end so shortly.

For the first time in a very long time, Zexion was envious. It had been so long that it took him several moments to recognize the emotion and take it for what it was worth. He was envious of the man because he was dying, and it seemed that if they could switch places, it would be for the best.

Quite obviously, that wasn't an option. Things like that only happened in fairytales or fiction. This was the real world they were living in, with its real, harsh truths. The real, harsh truth was that Demyx Myede was dying, and Zexion was living. The truth was that Zexion had been forcing himself into cold apathy for many years, and now it was not only unraveling, but slowly choking him out.

He ignored this latter truth because ignoring it was the easiest thing to do. Acknowledging it would mean being forced to change it, and he couldn't afford to change it. He didn't know how to live any other way.

His cellphone rang, breaking through his thoughts of Demyx and bringing him back to the present, although seeing the number displayed across the screen, he almost thought it was better that it hadn't. He'd rather think of 'his' patient than of the voice and face behind that number.

Zexion had never saved it to his phone. She didn't deserve it. Though he had so effectively lied to her in the past, and often would continue to do so, perhaps she was the one person in the world who he allowed himself to be actively spiteful and angry towards even on occasion.

And she would say, "I gave birth to you," as if he owed her for giving him life. Ah, yes, because he was just _so damn grateful _that she had brought him into this world for him to live through this wretched existence. He thought she was either too selfish or too naive then to give any consideration to the kind of life she would be bringing him into. Whichever it was, she hadn't changed.

For a moment he toyed with the idea of just ignoring her, but in the end, he pressed the little green button to connect the call.

"Zexy!" His mother's voice, overly cheerful, blasted through the speaker. He held the phone away from his ear slightly—he'd always wondered how someone as small as his mother could be so loud.

"How many times have I told you not to call me that?"

"I don't care, I'm your mother. I'll call you whatever I like. Silly."

"I am no such thing."

"Right, you're so overly serious. How is the community service going? How is Larxene? Is she treating you well?"

He could almost hear the wink in her voice, and he rolled his eyes, just biting back a groan. "It's going fine." he said shortly. "And you never listen to a word I say, I don't believe. Larxene and I are _not_ seeing each other, we have never seen each other, and we will _never_ see each other."

"I never said such a thing!"

"Implication is everything, mother."

"Anyway, don't you have any interest in knowing how life is at home?"

"None whatsoever."

There was a pause. "That's a cruel thing to say to your mother, Zexion. What about your father? Don't you want to know how he's doing?"

"No."

"…We wish you would come home, even for a visit"

Aggravated, Zexion closed his book and set it down on the shelf under the counter, abandoning the idea of reading anything else for the rest of the night. He wondered briefly that he hadn't inherited some of his mother's less than endearing traits, but brushed the idea off. "Why?" he said finally. "So I can hear you breaking everything in the house? So I can watch you showing off your flawless façade, oh, how happy you are! When I know that these things are a lie, mother. I'm quite aware. Fool the rest of the world all you want, it isn't my business. But I'm not blind."

"What a hurtful boy you are. Things aren't like that, Zexy. We really are happy, you know. Sometimes tensions just get high. It's stressful being married!"

"And if it's so stressful, then just divorce him, mother."

"I love your father."

"You're a terrible liar."

Suddenly it occurred to him that it felt very much like being part of a broken record, that old cliché. How many times had he had this conversation with her in the past year? Truthfully, he would allow himself to feel some vindictive pleasure if she would just step off and leave him the hell alone.

"You don't need to say these things to me," she protested.

"Ah, you know I have perhaps a million things I could say to you, and all of them are honest. Yet, you've raised me 'proper,' don't you think? I know what things a boy should not say to his parents, though I do enjoy edging along the lines of it like this."

"So hateful…"

"And you aren't?" He could feel the cruelty surging up into his body, and it was one of those few emotions he could welcome with open arms, at least under the present circumstances. This was one thing she _did_ deserve. "You're toxic, and if you aren't well aware of it by now, then you're even more ignorant than I've always thought you to be."

"Zexion! Stop it!"

"No—you're the one who needs to quit. Step off, mother. I'll be eighteen quite soon, as I'm sure you know, and it would please me greatly if you sent me nothing, gave me nothing, not so much as a phone call. I'm old enough to live my life apart from you, don't you think? I have been, after all. What makes you so assured that I need you? You corrupt everything you touch. If you think there is some flaw in my manner of existing, then the weight of that falls solely on you. No, I won't blame my father. You corrupted him as well."

"Zexion—"

"Goodnight, mother dearest."

He disconnected the call and knew that this would not be the end of it. She would call back, spitting insults into his voicemail, which he would be forced to listen to if he ever wished to access his inbox ever again.

It wasn't even three moments later before his phone rang again, that obnoxious number flickering across the display. He hit the ignore button and imagined all the things she was saying to his voicemail. Disrespectful, hurtful, little boy. A fuck up, never did anything right. She'd say all those things, and they would just… well, he wouldn't pay them any mind, even if she was correct in some of her accusations. After all, he'd said it right to her: anything that was wrong with him was her fault. So anything she said was disregarded. It was her fault.

* * *

_You have one unheard message._

_First unheard message:_

"_How could you do this to me? You ungrateful little shit! I gave birth to you! I raised you! You're not good for anything. You're sick! You're just like your father; your life is a waste. I should have gotten rid of you. I hope you go to hell, Zexion… just, go to hell…"_

* * *

Where was the progression, the natural evolution and change? Zexion toed his way through the slush, the chill seeming to seep down into his bones and settle there. Human beings, despite their flaws, were intended to adapt to change, to move along naturally. Was this adapting? He still drew breath into his lungs. Was apathy a flaw in genetics, or was it an advantage? Was it an adaptation to unfortunate circumstances?

He shrugged his slender shoulders. A hard wind swept through the city and hit him. The train blew its whistle. At the core of his being the threads were coming loose and beginning to unravel, but he maintained in his mind that this wasn't happening. Tomorrow would be better than today. He supposed hope as well was an adaptation—not that he would call his hope for what it was.

But this should have changed. He didn't need it to, of course, he didn't need anything. Still, it should have.

Larxene was completely motionless on the couch when he walked in, looking for all the world as if she had something on her mind.

"No unsuspecting victims tonight?" he asked, draping his coat over the back of a chair in the kitchen.

"I'm not a succubus, you know." She looked up at him and cracked a sardonic smile.

"Hmm, you had me fooled… and nobody fools me."

"Your mother called here."

"Did she."

"Yeah. She was hysterical. Look, Zex, you know I hate to bring it up, but maybe you should do—"

"Larxene," he said, keeping his voice perfectly controlled. "I don't need to do anything about my mother. I do not wish to talk to her or about her. "

"But you must have talked to her, from what she said."

"Drop it."

"But—"

"Larxene," he repeated coldly, and seemed to cut her off at the knees. She said nothing as he fixed himself a drink.

As he headed to his room, she spoke again, quietly. "I just want what's best for you."

"Ah, yes. And my condolences to you for that."

He stepped into his room, shut his door, and locked it, effectively ending the conversation. Yes, she was sometimes more than tolerable, but in the end she was barely less foolish than the rest of them. She didn't believe in _love_, but friendship—yes, she hoped for true friendship. She wished him well, but he didn't need her well wishes. They were words. Just asinine words.

Words were nothing but weapons, and most humans didn't even have the sense to use them that way.

_**I want what's best for you**_**.**

_Well then, Larxene, why don't you just wish upon a goddamn star. Do me one better and throw a penny in a fountain. We all know those kinds of things just change the world._


	5. Day Four

A/N: Long break, right? But I'm back - and Candystriper is in full swing. I'm excited and inspired, guys. I really hope you enjoy and remember to review, review, review~!

* * *

**Afraid of the Dark ((You're the Tragedy))**

* * *

"It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas, every – "

"Shut up, Larxene."

"Ten days left…."

"You're insufferable."

"Have you gotten my present yet?"

Zexion sighed and turned back to his newspaper. Soldiers were dying, children starving. He read over it all with utter indifference. He was just bored and besides, sometimes if he read to himself he could tune out Larxene, who was being decidedly obnoxious that morning. She was definitely a different breed of being – normal, _sane_ people would have the _decency _to be angry with him for being an asshole, but Larxene seemed unaffected. Or maybe she was just being extra chipper to piss him off. He wouldn't put it past her.

And his mother thought he was dating her. Ha. Ha.

_If_ he was going to date _anyone_ in the first place, it most certainly wouldn't be Larxene. He counted himself lucky for not sleeping with her, and he thought he was only one of few men in Chicago who hadn't. Sex was like air to her. To Zexion, it was like ice cream – good, but in moderation. Occasionally a man or woman would catch his eye and he'd take them to bed (it was never hard to snag them, the boys liked his willowy figure and the women fell right for his eyes when he made them sparkle just right), but it was more like sating a sweet tooth than fulfilling a need.  
Larxene's horrible Christmas keening continued. He looked at the clock. He'd even go to the hospital early if it would get him out of it, though he knew he'd have to listen to her the entire car ride. He hoped she'd stop singing. Ugh. For a moment he considered just walking, then swiftly decided against it, as he would like to encounter as few snowmen as was absolutely necessary.

"Let's just go." He said, cutting off his roommate's vomit worthy rendition of 'Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer.'"

"Sure, but I was just getting to the best part."

"Can't you have a little mercy?"

"Mercy? What's that?" She laughed, scooping her car keys off the kitchen counter. Zexion set down the newspaper, slid into his coat, and stepped out after her into the bitter cold.

* * *

Apparently Larxene had remembered what mercy meant, because the ride to Castle Memorial was absent of her singing (if you could call it that), for which Zexion was grateful. With Christmas just over a week away, Chicago was full of blinking lights and large, cheery window displays – he wasn't sure if he could have taken the sight of it with Larx's wailing to top it off.

He scowled. Christmas was a ridiculous holiday, he hated it, it was pointless. He failed to see why he should have to act kinder towards people, smile and tip extra just to celebrate the birth of a counterfeit deity. It was everything he hated about everyone else.

"You're so fuckin' spacey." Larxene said.

"Shut up."

"Well, are you going to get out of my car or what? We're here."

"Right." He unbuckled his seatbelt and pushed the door open.

"What time are you going to be home tonight?"

"Like I fucking know. When I'm home." He slammed the door shut and stalked into the hospital.

* * *

The hospital was so full of holiday cheer that Zexion thought he might be sick. Red, gold, and green garland adorned the hallways; silver baubles hung from everywhere; the color scheme didn't even match. It was disgusting.

_You're so gay, _he heard Larxene's voice in his head, _Like the gay grinch.  
_

"Oh, shut up." He muttered, and rolled his eyes. Kairi, a few feet away, shot him a glance, which he promptly ignored. He was annoyed that Larx's 'witty' one-liners were invading his mind even when she was't there.

He gripped his book of Shakespeare closer and headed toward the elevator. Roxas was already waiting.

"Looks like Christmas threw up in here." The blonde said under his breath. Zexion couldn't help a small smile.

"Yeah."

"I'm surprised Kairi isn't distracted by the shiny things."

Now he actually laughed. "I'd be lucky if she were."  
The elevator doors opened and the two stepped in without another word to each other. The rest of the ride continued in the same silent fashion, but the silence was mutual and comfortable. Zexion figured it was probably the most enjoyable elevator ride he'd ever shared with another person.

He got off at his floor with a nod to Roxas.

It was time to see Demyx.

The television wasn't on, which he was beginning to expect. Demyx was watching the lake – frozen and still, lifeless.

"The lake is more interesting than television?"

"Have you ever read the Catcher and the Rye?"

"I'm familiar with it." Zexion replied, thrown off guard by the patient's reply, which had come seemingly apropos of nothing. Nonetheless, his dogeared copy of the book was underneath the counter at the café.

"Someone – a friend – he used to read it to me. When I was a kid. I liked it a lot. Remember, Holden asked about the ducks?"

"Sure, I remember."

"Well, I want to figure it out before I die."

"Oh?"

"Well, it's one of the reasons, anyway. About the lake." He flashed Zexion an unnerving smile. "But, we're not close enough yet, you and I. You can help me figure out about the ducks, though, if you want."

"It's a tragedy - "

"No." Demyx cut him off. The smile was getting to him, he felt like he was being exposed. "I'm not the tragedy here. It's you. You're the tragedy."

"Uh.."

Dem slid the heavy black shutters closed over the window, and turned to Zexion, as if giving him his full attention. "Can we read now?" He asked.

"Yeah." Zexion opened the book.

But then the lights flickered, and went out.

* * *

__

The air is hot and stale. The walls are closing in on him. He's going to suffocate. He's going to die. Everything outside is so loud, glass and ceramic crashing and breaking against tile floors, Mother shrieking like a goddamned harpy. Flesh hits flesh, father's slapped her. She shrieks louder, furious.

(It's almost over, will be, there's a gener - )

_"Shut up!" his father growls. "The kid's gonna hear you."  
_

_"I don't care, the little monster's not __**my**__ kid, not __**mine**__, I'm just like Rosemary - he's your son - the bastard's yours - "  
_

(The shades, the shades, why won't he open the shades)

_It's so small, so dark  
_

(You're not in the closet)

_Just make it stop  
_

(Get a hold of yourself)

There was light.

* * *

He was going to be sick. He was sure. His stomach was twisted, his throat tight. The cold tile felt good against his cheek, but Zexion knew that it wasn't going to be enough. He gagged. Fuck.

A metal wastebasket appeared suddenly in front of him - he grasped onto the edges gratefully and leaned into it just in time. What little he had left in his stomach was expelled violently, as if his body were trying to purge itself of the memory; he was faintly aware of thin hands holding back his hair as he continued to be sick and then to dry heave for another several moments. Larx's hands, probably, sometimes she could be good to him like that or -

He slid back onto the floor and laid his face against the tile for a while before he recovered himself, realizing suddenly that he was at the hospital still, that it had not been Larxene's hands in his hair but Demyx's.

A string of violent obscenities richocheted off the walls of his skull as he pulled himself carefull off the floor, trying to look unruffled.

"I'm not feeling well. I think I should go home."

"Sure, if you want." Dem said casually. Zexion had to stop himself from bolting for the door, instead forcefully pacing himself. "Oh, and by the way, Zex."

"Yes?"

"You should eat more than you drink. What was that, vodka and cran? Well, have one for me tonight, okay? And take care of yourself."

Zexion didn't say anything. He just left the room, took the elevator and willed it to go as quick as it could, stripping from his hospital clothing. He was glad he'd put it on over his outfit instead of in lieu of it. Kairi gave him a confused look as he rushed past her, already mostly out of his uniform.

"Is everything okay?" She asked, sounding genuinely concerned.

"I think I've come down with something. I don't feel well at all. I'm going to have to ask you if I can leave early."

"Absolutely. You look so pale..." She reached out to feel his forehead. He flinched away, his stomach twisting painfully.

"Thank you." He murmured over the constricted feeling in his throat. "I really need to go now. Have a good evening." He dashed out of the hospital, terrified he would lose what might be left in his stomach, if anything, all over the immaculate floor. Bad enough that one person (Demyx, of all people, why him?) had seen it...he couldn't take anything else.

He slowed his pace as he put distance between himself and Castle Memorial and his stomach began to settle. He had some time left before he was expected at work, so he decided to take the long route to the cafe. There was no way in Hell he was calling Larxene to get him. She knew how he was, knew of all his habits and nervous reactions, his fears. And her sympathy was another thing he just couldn't deal with at the moment.

He passed through Skid Row, but he felt neither revulsion nor pity for the vagrants and junkies littering the streets. He didn't care where they came from or why they were there. Prostitutes smoked cheap cigarettes and called to him from their corners and posts. He supposed he was rather well dressed by their standards. They probably thought that was the only reason someone like him would be in a place like that, or maybe they weren't thinking at all, high or just poor.

"The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away." He murmured quietly to himself, and was reminded of Sundays, his parents with their Catholic smiles and the mindless masses praying without passion, the cold, unfeeling marble.

His feet his something quite unexpectedly and he tripped, stumbled.

"Now, what are you going on about?"

Zexion snapped back to reality and discovered that he'd tripped over a pair of long legs attached to a long, lanky body - a manslashchild, who could only be slightly older than himself, with a veritable lion's mane of red hair and teardrop tattoos beneath striking green eyes. A joint hung from his thin, smirking lips.

"Did you just trip me?" Zexion asked.

"Nah. I'm not that malicious. You just weren't paying attention."

"Oh. That's...unusual. I'm typically very attentive."

"Rough day?"

The ghost of a smile, just barely there. "You could say that."

The stranger took the joint from his lips and offered it to Zexion. "Have a hit, then, man. Sit down, get out of your head."

He took it and inhaled smoke deeply. What he really wanted was a tall glass of alcohol and anything would do, but preferrably a vodka and cranberry. Still, this would do. He never turned down the opportunity to get out of his head.

"I'm not a social smoker." He said as he sat down next to the stranger.

"Yeah? What, do you get crazy stupid?"

"Not really."

"Then you just aren't a social person."

"Not by choice, no."

"Well, it's nice to meet you, anyway. I'm Axel." He held out his hand and Zexion shook it. It was rough but slender, with long, tapered fingers. And he didn't know...why he was there, why he'd accepted a puff from some strange kind-of kid with facial tattoos when he had a perfectly good stash at home, why he'd gone so far as to sit down. None of it made sense except for deep down he felt like maybe he was supposed to meet Axel. Maybe. If things like fate existed, and that was a big 'if'.

"You know, for someone who syas they're attentive, you look pretty spacey. You gonna tell me your name or what?"

"It's Zexion."

"Zex, then."

"Whatever you'd like."

They passed the joint back and forth for several silent moments before Axel asked "What's a kid like you doing here, anyway?"

"Are you always this nosy?"

"Sure." He affirmed with a nord. "But I expect the same from anyone I meet."

"Strange." Zexion took another hit and held it in his lungs, exhaled.

"Not really. You've gotta know who you're dealin' with, feel 'em out, you know?"

"Wh - so - are those - tattoos beneath your eyes?"

"Yep."

"Why?"

"Google it." Axel said with a Cheshire Cat grin, and Zexion decided he'd rather not know.

* * *

He walked away from Skid Row with a dimebag of grass and an invitation to come see Axel again. Which he kind of wanted to do, mostly - he rationalized - because it would be useful to have a contact out there.

The cafe was as uneventful as always. He sat behind the counter and read his book, snuck smokes out the back exit, slowly started working through the time. _God,_ did he crave a drink. A drink was better than anything else for getting out of his head, which he desperately wanted to do.

Demyx was troubling him. Dem had seen, even from the beginning, but now what once were mere suspicions had been confirmed. He wondered if he'd talked. Larxene said that sometimes he talked during an 'episode.'

She pulled up to the cafe shortly after midnight, and honked the horn. Zexion shut off the lights, locked the door behind him, and climbed into the car. She examined him.

"You had a shitty day."

"Come again?"

"You're pale." She put the care into gear and drove, thankfully turning her eyes onto the road.

"Oh. It was alright." He lied, though he knew she saw right through it. "I met a guy."

"Hot?"

"I suppose." he shrugged.

"Hm. You had a shit day, yet you're tolerable - so how much weed did you smoke?"

"...a lot."

"Thought so." She laughed. "You're too relaxed for it to be anything else. So, this guy. Are you going to - "

"I don't have any plans for it."

"Oh, right. You're an aesexual little twit."

"Not aesexual, Larxene." He droned boredly.

"I know, I know. Not aesexual, just picky."

"Unlike some people, I don't feel like turning my genitalia into a petri dish."

They pulled up in front of the apartment complex. Zexion jumped out of the car and rushed ahead of his roommated, into the lobby and then the elevator, up to the third floor.

Inside the apartment he wasted no time in mixing his drink.

_You should eat more than you drink. _He heard Dem's voice in his head and tried to tune it out, sipping slowly at his drink as he headed for his room. It was warm and sweet as it slid down his throat. It was perfection, the closest to Heaven he thought he'd ever have. Larxene came in behind him. He ignored her and closed his bedroom door, laid on his bed.

Everything was alright now. It was perfectly fine. He was satisified - though he thought of the blonde patient, the thoughts didn't bother him nearly as much. He thought Demyx must have been beautiful, once, before he got sick. Robust and golden, like Adonia. But now...now he was weak and going to die. C'est la vie. Deaths, both little and large, were a part of life.

It was with this thought that Zexion drifted off to sleep, blissfully unafraid of the day to come.


	6. Day Five

**the-necessary-but-totally-spoils-all-my-fun-disclaimer: **I don't own Kingdom Hearts. I don't own Zexion (although if it were up to me..), Demyx, or any other of the sexy Orgy Thirteen boys (but Squeenix, you can keep Xaldin, Lex, and Veken, k?).

**A/N: **So, 'Candystriper' has undergone a title change, boys and girls :) I wasn't too satisfied with the title, so I wanted to give it one with a little more meaning and though. "Trains and Sewing Machines" comes from the song _Hide and Seek _by Imogen Heap - it's a great song, so I'd advise everyone to look it up.

As for this chapter, I feel like it's a little weak, but it was a necessary one. I suppose I'll let you guys be the jugde. Please - review, review, review! I don't know how to make y'all happy if you don't tell me what you want or how I'm doing :) So, on to chapter six of the newly christened Trains and Sewing Machines - enjoy ^_^.

* * *

**~Drinking (Another Hole in the Wall)~**

* * *

Zexion stared, nearly dumbfounded, at Axel, who was playing a scratched and beaten guitar while a comrade hammered out a rhythm on overturned trashcans that gleamed morosely in the weak morning light. Axel had yet to notice him; his head was tipped back, the pale and vulnerable flesh of his neck exposed as he sang. Zexion could see the skin trembling as his vocal chords vibrated against it. His voice was a soulful tenor as beaten and scratched as the guitar, but it was not altogether unpleasant.

Suddenly, the drummer stopped playing his makeshift drum set. "What's this chap staring at us for, Ax?" He asked in a British accent much too quaint for its current surroundings.

The music trailed off. Axel righted his head and opened his green eyes, startling against the sharp features of his face and his hair, which glowed like lit embers.

"Oh! That's Zex. Hey, man." He slung an arm around around Zexion's shoulders. The boy flinched, but forced himself not to pull away. He pushed a smile onto his face that looked much easier than it was. Axel grinned wolfishly. "You sure are dressed down today, huh?"

He looked down at himself, at the white-tshirt covered with paint splatters of varying colors and Larxene's 'stylishly' ripped jeans, which hugged his slim hips and took up a nearly permanent residence in the back of his dresser drawer. Seeing Demyx today hadn't been an option, so he'd called in sick – and instead of sleeping in like any reasonable human being would do, he had instead rummaged through his clothing until he found the ruined outfit, dressed, and left before his roommate even woke. He'd headed for Skid Row.

Why, he didn't know. It had seemed like the only correct solution to a string of impossibly complex equations happening inside his brain, a natural function. Still, it didn't serve to explain _why. Why _he was standing like a goddamn idiot in the middle of a filthy street with filthy people his parents had raised him to step on. It seemed to him that he'd been doing too many things lately, too many impulsive things, too many outrageously _emotional _things, contradictory to the apathy he'd always basked in. Everything was rational to him. But this, this thing with Axel, this friendship, this Skid Row thing – it wasn't rational at all.

"Hel-lo?" Axel crooned sardonically, snapping his fingers in front of Zexion's blank face. "You are one zoned kid. Are you even alive in there?"

_You don't want to know the answer to that. _"Yeah." He said, casting aside his thoughts for the moment. "Just thinking about something."

"Anything important?"

"No." _Demyx. You. Everything. Hell. _"Nothing important at all. What were you singing?"

"The blues." He strummed his guitar. "You sing?"

"I don't, as a rule."

"You know what they say about rules.."

"I've broken a few, but never the ones I've made for myself."

There was a silence between them. Zexion noted that the Row on a Sunday morning was different that the Row on a Saturday night; fewer hookers called for tricks, but the panhandlers and hustlers were out in full force.

Axel cleared his throat somewhat uncomfortably, though Zexion doubted that Axel was ever uncomfortable anywhere. "Do you drink?" He asked. "I mean, would you go for one?"

_Holy hell, yes.  
_

"Axel." The drummer interjected suddenly. "It's nine in the morning, I highly doubt…"

"No, it's fine." Zexion said. "It's my day off."

"It's a little early to go to a bar. Hm, how about - my place?"

"Yeah. Whatever."

_You're a liar, _he chided himself as he followed Axel, _and you should heed your own warnings. Don't get attached to anything, remember? Remember? Don't care about him, don't care for him. He's just another junkie, but he might be useful. And that goes for Demyx, too.  
_

"Here we are." Axel said, snapping him once more and mercifully from his own thoughts. They had stopped in front of a ramshackle duplex that clearly didn't know what it was good for, all peeling paint and splintered wooden porches. Zexion blinked, staring. "What, are you scared of it or something? Come on, we're not _quite _in Cabrini Green."

"Right outside of it."

"Well, that counts for something, right?"

"Touche." He muttered reluctantly. He followed Axel inside the first apartment, which was small and had a peculiar smell, like Axe and spray paint and marijuana with a nicotine chaser.

"Welcome to my humble abode, as they say. What do you want to drink?"

He glanced at the clock. So early, and he was already craving something strong. "Vodka." He said. "Please. With cranberry, if you've got it. I don't particularly give a damn."

"You know, kid…"

"I'm not a kid."

"Younger than me."

"Not by much."

Axel laughed in that cavalier way of his as he opened the refrigerator to pull out a gallon of cranberry juice. "How old do you think I am? No, wait. Don't answer that. I'm twenty-four. And you're, what, nineteen?"

"Seventeen, eighteen soon."

"Young. See, you are a kid. Hey – you can turn on the T.V if you want. Reception's shit, but what're you gonna do, right?"

"Yeah. Sure."

The first drink of the day was always the best one, and Zexion loved Sundays because – at least before his candy striping days – Sunday was the day that he could wake up drunk if it suited him, and stay that way for as long as he wanted. Sunday was the day he didn't have to be anywhere; he was off from the café, and there was nobody to answer to, no hurried showers and toast to sober up before work in case the boss came in. Yes, Sundays had been glorious before the accident. And now, it seemed, he would get one more stab at that glory.

Because this Sunday was good. Of course, he was in the apartment of a man who was nearly a stranger to him, drinking drinks that he didn't make, but it didn't matter. He was comfortable. He was alright.  
Axel seemed to have reached a level of optimal comfort. He was spread out on the couch next to Zexion, head tipped, arms wide across the back. "Why didn't you sing?" He asked. "I mean, why don't you sing?"

"What?"

"When I asked. You've got too many rules. I could fuck you if you didn't have so many rules, y'know? If you sang."

"I don't want to fuck you." Zexion said. He was ninety-five percent sure he was being honest. The frightening thing was that he didn't know about Axel, didn't know what this thing _was._ It was only the second time he'd met him, but he felt like Ax was someone he'd known his whole life. He didn't want to feel anything when it came to anybody. But he knew after few drinks that with Axel (and Demyx, something in the back of his head nagged), that certainly wasn't the case. The feeling wasn't sexual and he was fairly sure it wasn't romantic, so what was it?

He didn't want to think about the subject anymore, so he leaned forward, peering at the clock once again.

"It's…I don't know, it's three in the afternoon." He said. "There has to be some place we can go now. Can't we go to a bar?"

"So long?"

"Well, yeah. But – we've kind of paced ourselves – haven't we?"

"Sure. I guess." Axel said, pulling himself upright. "Okay. Answer my question and we'll go."

"Which - "

"Why didn't you sing?"

"Dunno. Guess I don't really have anything to sing about. I mean, I can't really."

"But -"

"I answered your question." He stood up. "So let's go."

* * *

"Hey, Axel - "

Axel ripped his attention away from the bartender he'd been fawning over, and directed it at Zexion, who was leaning heavily against the bar. They'd been there for a long time now; it was just past dark, and the bar, a little hole in the wall not too far off the Row, was beginning to get crowded. Usually he drank in places much less populated than this one, but now he was inebriated just enough that he didn't care.

"Yeah?"

"Do you, uh." The words got lost for a second. "Do you know where the birds go in the winter?"

The look on Axel's face was politely surprised at the question, which had come seemingly apropos of nothing. "Don't they go like, south or something?"

"Right. South. They go fucking _south._ Who doesn't know that?" He sighed and downed the rest of his drink, the glass clinking with finality as he set it back down. Axel raised an eyebrow. "Don't worry about it." Zexion murmured. "I think too much."

"Well, stop. You're killing my buzz."

"It was just - nevermind." He ordered another vodka and cranberry, which he drank with the thirst of a man who had been lost in the desert for forty days. He was at that particular level of _drunk _where his thoughts were running into each other and he wasn't sure what came next - if he would do something infinitely stupid, or pass out, or cry. Everything was so complicated now. Apathy was so simple, so simple that he had never had to work for it. Why, now, did it seem a struggle? And all the things he'd known were changing abruptly. It was hard to adjust, comparable to losing your equilibrium. It was emotional vertigo. Strange how he'd thought himself immune to such a thing simply on the virtue of not feeling anything (_or at least, he used to be able to not - )._Larxene was trying to be supportive, except Larxene wouldn't know supportive if it bitch slapped her. She just didn't understand that -

_"Come on, Zexy" The voice, overly sweet, crooned in his ear. "It's time to go to church."  
_

_Zexion, freshly thirteen, opened one eye just a slit. His mother's face was slightly bruised - he guessed they'd gone a little too far last night, but hell if he knew, he'd started sleeping through their nightly violence - and he knew that she'd have it covered in makeup soon enough. "Let me sleep." He muttered. He didn't want to go to church. It was...pointless. Ritual, religion, to hell with God. He wanted no part of the hypocrisy.  
_

_"But - "  
_

_"I don't believe in your God, and I'm certain you don't either. Shut up and let me sleep."  
_

_She snarled, and grasped a fistful of his hair.  
_

_**Shit**, he thought. **There goes sleeping in.**  
_

_"You ungrateful little - "_

And Larxene was of the opinion he should just kiss and make up with them. Ha. Money didn't constitute love and didn't demand it, and the only reason they'd thrown that fancy lawer at him in the first place was to save face, so that they could show themselves in their narrow-minded society.

"Hey, Zex, man, your mom is calling." Axel waved his cell phone at him; Zexion snatched it and pressed ignore.

_Fucking great, _he thought to himself.

"Don't want Mommy to hear you shitfaced?"

"She's a bitch!" He yelled, surprising both Axel and himself with the sudden outburst. He ordered another drink and prayed for being numb. This, _this _was why he didn't drink with other people, because he'd get so drunk and just _say _things like that. He hoped Axel wouldn't remember the next day - and Axel, showing some sort of human decency, let it go and said nothing.

They stayed for a long time, even after they'd been cut off.

"I gotta work." Axel said.

"Drunk, at midnight?"

"Late shift. Lax job."

"Whatever." He muttered, sliding clumsily off the barstool. The bartender seemed impressed that he was still standing, but he knew what he was doing. Kind of. He just wasn't very keen on seeing the inside of Castle Memorial so soon. Ashe made for the door, he slammed full force into a blonde boy with pretty blue eyes.

"Roxas?" He slurred, after the room had stopped spinning so wildly.

"Oh - hey, Zex. Sorry about that." Roxas flashed a small smile and slipped past into the crowd. Zexion couldn't even think about that. He just pushed out into the night.

Having already lost his drinking partner somewhere in the packed bat, he found himself alone on the city streets. He felt like Chicago was quieter that usual, but thought maybe he had just muted out all the noise.

He began to wander aimlessly with not even the faintest idea where he was headed. The ground was doing this thing where it tilted, and he swore the world was trying to knock him off balance. Still, he walked. And eventually - when his legs, tired and unsteady, screamed for mercy - he sat down on the curb.

Sometime later, he heard the squeal of brakes as a red convertible slammed to a stop in front of him. The passenger door swung open.

"Get in the car." Larxene spat from the driver's seat. "Get in the fucking car." He stared blankly. "_Now, _Zexion!"

He laughed and struggled to his feet. "No need to be _mad, _Larxy, it's just that - " He plopped down in the passenger seat and promptly forgot what he was saying.

"Where the hell" she said tersely once they were driving. "Where the _hell_ do you get off thinking you canjust take off like - "

"Shut the fuck up, Larxene!" He yelled. She was only faintly surprised, well aware of how he got when he was drinking. As if the little bastard wasn't moody enough already. "You aren't my goddamn - "

"Mother, I know, but now I have to spend my night looking - "

"Fuck you." He muttered, suddenly too tired to yell. "You didn't have to do anything."


	7. Day Six

**A/N: '**Holy hell, another update?' said my imaginary reader, named Phil. 'But it takes you ages to update anything ever!' That's right, everyone: another. update. I had no idea this would happen so quickly, but this chapter seemed to write itself. Which was nice, for a change. I won't keep Phil hanging on baited breath, so without further adieu (and be nice, review!) - Trains and Sewing Machines, Day Six.

* * *

**~Transparent (Mommy's Little Boy)~**

* * *

After two subsequent hours spent emptying the contents of his stomach and one splitting headache later, Zexion glanced at the digital alarm clock on the nightstand beside his bed. He winced at the glaring red letters that proudly proclaimed it to be seven thirty in the morning; he groaned and pressed his cheek into the bed sheet. No rest for the wicked. Community service – and Demyx, along with it – called.

He didn't want to see Demyx. But it wasn't something he could just continue putting off.

He spent the next fifteen minutes attempting not to look like hell. His stomach revolted at the thought of food, so he skipped breakfast and knocked on the door to Larxene's bedroom. She answered, unashamed, in a towel. He wished she would at least _attempt _to be more decent, and rolled his eyes.

"What?" She barked. "You're up? Well, hold yourself. I'm getting dressed. Get the hell out."

He winced at the volume of her harsh tone, which grated against his every nerve and made the pounding in his head worse. He wandered out into the living room and sat on the couch. When Larxene came out just a few moments later, he shot her a sever look; she responded with her cheeriest 'go fuck yourself' smile.

"Did you sleep well?" She asked with false concern. Certain that she already knew the answer, he chose not to dignify the question with a response. He simply stood up and followed his roommate out to the car.

The cold slapped him brutally in the face. For once, he welcomed the sensation. It was nearly refreshing, seemed to lessen the pain a little bit, and once he was in the passenger seat of the convertible he laid his head against the cool glass of the window and remained typically silent on the ride to the hospital. He climbed out without so much as saying goodbye to Larxene. She was clearly feeling especially ornery, and he was far from in the mood to deal with it.

Inside Castle Memorial, he was almost immediately accosted by Kairi.

"How are you feeling?" She asked. Her concern was genuine, which made it worse. He smiled at her, though a selection of colorful epithets were running through his mind.

"Much better." He lied. He changed into the painfully white uniform and stalled himself for a while by taking on other menial tasks – changing bedpans, handing out mail. But he knew. He had to go see…go see _him. _He opted out on taking the elevator and instead took the stairs. Slowly. As slowly as he could justify without feeling ridiculous.

On his way down the hallway, he nearly ran right into Roxas. His mind provided him with a brief flashback of the night before, and he bit back a groan. Roxas waved. He waved back.

"I was surprised to see you last night." He said honestly.

"I'm surprised you're here today." Roxas said back, hint of a smirk on his lips. "I feel shitty, and I could have been _half_ as drunk as you were."

"Yeah. Don't remind me."

"Deal. I have to get these linens changed…..guess I'll see you soon?"

"Not like we have a choice." He said, and heard Roxas laugh as he began to move on with the linen cart. Sighing, Zexion moved on until he reached the dreaded white door with those little black numbers. _669. _

He wasn't shocked that the television wasn't on, wasn't shocked that Demyx was staring out at the water. Or to be more accurate, the ice. The lake had frozen over. At least as far as they could see.

With a move so slow it was agonizing, Demyx turned his head to look at Zexion, whose heart nearly stopped when those blue eyes bore into him.

"I knew you'd come back." Dem said. A smile spread across his bruised, gaunt face. "Even if only because you don't have any choice."

There, those words again. Muttered to Roxas and spit back at him by an AIDS patient who seemed far too calm for his entire situation.

Zexion reached for the book, but Demyx shook his head. "Can't we just talk?" He asked. "I feel like I haven't talked to anyone in a long time, 'cept for doctors and nurses, but that gets a little lonely. Come on, sit down at least."

He obliged him, sitting down in a chair by Demyx's bed, unsure why he felt so uneasy at the request. Like always, he forced a smile.

"Don't smile."

"Come again?"

"Really, don't. Not if you don't want to."

"I do."

"Liar." Demyx laughed. "Don't make me hit you where it hurts."

"Like you could hurt me."

"Your mother…" The smile dropped from Zexion's face as quickly as if he'd been punched in the mouth. "I'm sorry." Demyx apologized hurriedly. "I shouldn't have said something like that just to prove a point. I can be really awful sometimes. But I kind of wanted to talk to you about that, anyway. Your mom, I mean."

"Speak, then." Zexion said, his eyes and tone dead. That _bitch _just wouldn't stop invading his life, even the parts of it he didn't like (all of it, his inner voice whispered softly). He thought he would feel much better about the situation if she were dead. And if hate, as some people speculated, was the act of wishing someone off the planet, then he certainly hated his mother – it was the only emotion he openly embraced, and his hatred was only furthered by the fact that she could make him feel it.

"Did she – abuse you?"

"No."

Demyx's brows furrowed. "Don't lie to me. Please. I mean, I know lying's kind of your thing, but…."

"What do you mean, lying's my thing?"

"Oh, geez, I – look, Zexion, I've – I've know some people like you, okay? Nothing good ever happens to them. I know I haven't known you so long, but…." His voice dropped to a near whisper. "but I don't want those bad things to happen to you, too."

Demyx stared at him with those eyes, and Zexion felt the rifts in his heard grown wider and deeper. Felt the tears in his façade become more numerous.

"She didn't beat me." He managed quietly. "Mother didn't hurt me."

He was alarmed. Was that _his _voice? Normally confident, flawless, elegant – now quiet, subdued.

"It's okay." Demyx said. "We can read. It's really alright. I'm sorry. I should have said anything."

Zexion reached for the book. He was relieved to hear that his voice was once again steady and sure.

**.x.**

There was a split second, just a moment, where Zexion seriously considered tossing himself into the frozen lake. It would be cold, and the cold would feel so good. It would be the kind of freezing that went deep, all the way down to his bones and his broken heart. But his ego interrupted the thoughts and won out. His sense of self-preservation had just enough fight left in it to battle suicide, and as tempting as death might seem, he knew that deep down he was a coward.

Demyx had torn him open and laid him bare. That had never happened before. Even Larxene, whose tongues flayed men like knives, had never managed it. But _Dem_ - his eyes shining with misplaced serenity and an illusion of innocence – had ripped everything apart with just a few words intended to be honest and calm.

_I don't want those bad things to happen to you, too._He shuddered, but it was not from the bitter cold.

What he'd told Demyx was true, mostly. His mother had only beaten him a total of three times in his seventeen years. Never when he was a small child; only, he thought, once she had begun to see him as more man than boy. She hated men.

As he pushed open the door to the café, he was struck by a memory of that special kind of violence whose medium was not hands but words.

**.x.**

_He was fourteen years old, nearly fifteen, and the past year and half had brought about many changes in his physique. Though he would never be particularly tall, he had gone from laughably short to a height that was considered acceptable for someone his age; the little remaining baby fat had melted from his frame, and his body was now sharp and angular. His hair had grown out considerably, as he was old enough to decide to keep it long._

_He was draped across the loveseat in his bedroom, thumbing though his copy of Catcher in the Rye – newly purchased – when he was suddenly interrupted by the sound of a soft, whining wail from downstairs. For a moment he thought absurdly that they had gotten a puppy, then remembered that he was allergic and so that most certainly was not the case. It was his mother, no doubt._

_Though he was tempted to toss the book across the room in elegant frustration, he set it down gently, adverse to treating a work of art so brutally. He stood up and started down the hallway quietly. Truthfully he wasn't too concerned as to why his mother was crying. But he supposed it was his duty to find out._

_He took the stairs down to the living room, or the 'parlor' as his mother referred to it in his best society voice. He found her slumped against the coffee table, sobbing quietly and somehow with dignity. He cautiously stepped over the broken glass and laid a hand on her shoulder._

_She snapped her head to look at him. Her eyes burned, but he felt it not at all. He was far past giving a damn about things such as that. His apathy had begun to head for its peak._

_"Zexion." She said, slapping his hand away. Her voice was devoid of the normal exaggerated sweetness. It dripped not with honey now, but with malice._

_"Mother." He responded simply._

_"Don't call me that. I am not your mother. You – have – become – a monster – my little boy has gone!"_  
_"I have only grown up."_

_"You are a man, a filthy – disgusting – man. I loathe you! I despise the very sight of you!"_

_He wondered idly if she would hit him, like she had the first time he'd refuse to go to church with her. Though he wasn't sure that 'hit' would be the correct word to describe the way she'd thrown him up against the way and beaten him. The rage on her face had elicited a delicate shiver that slid down his spine. Now, he held none of that fear. Only a resigned acceptance, an apathy so deep that he no longer cared about even what happened to him. His survival instincts were the first place that that apathy had enveloped completely._

_"Shall I go then, mother?"_

_"DO. NOT. CALL. ME. THAT!" she shrieked, her voice edging towards a manic hysteria. "You are nothing but a complete and total fuck-up. I should have never had you! What a relief my life would have been without you, you son-of-a-bitch, you – "_

_"Son of a bitch?" His father's voice broke the onslaught of words like a rock breaking the waves. "That sounds about right."_

_His father had appeared in the living room, holding a glass of scotch. Zexion had long since begun to understand why his father drank._

_"You - !"_

_"Lay off him, for fuck's sake. He's a kid. Look at him. He's only fuckin' fourteen. Just because you're a raging feminist bitch doesn't mean you have to take it out on him. Zexion, go to your room."_

_He obeyed without a word. He went upstairs and flopped down on his bed; it was only a moment before their screaming flared up for the second time that night. He put on his headphone and turned Beethoven's 'Pathetique' Sonata in C Minor up to full volume. It drained out the sound of his parents and his thoughts, the echo of words which stung somewhere deep within him. She was just like a viper._

_Some time later, the door to his room opened. It did not creak because in his parents' house, nothing creaked, except for the sound acrylic nails just before they broke._

_Without even opening his eyes, he knew it was his father who had entered his room. While his mother's presence was sharp and toxic, his father's was quiet, drunk. Zexion wondered what the man was really like. All he saw now was a broken reflection of the woman downstairs. A victim who had fallen by his own fondness for pretty society girls, and now found himself twisted and bent to her whims._

_"Son." He said, sitting on the edge of the bed. Zexion still did not open his eyes or respond. "You know…well, you know how she is…" He stroked his son's hair. It was a weak attempt at an apology, and Zexion simply turned over, pretending to be asleep._

**.x.**

He rose to his feet from the café table he'd taken a seat at. He'd been a few minutes early and Xion, who had the shift before him, wasn't quite off yet. But now she was clocking out. She smiled at him as she passed on her way to the door, and he took his seat behind the counter.

It was calm and uneventful. He read and rang customers up.

At nine o' clock, the bell above the door chimed. Thinking it was only another customer, he set his book down and stood up. The sight of flaming red hair sent a shock through his system.

"Axel?"

"Hey, Zex." Axel waved. "Thought you said you worked here. Hope you don't mind that I dropped in."

Strangely, he found that he didn't. "No, it's fine. Uh, have a seat or something."

Axel pulled a chair up to the side of the counter, and only then did Zexion notice his companion's unusual attire – shorts that looked suspiciously like boxer briefs, a tank top, and a long black coat, presumably to protect him from the cold. The effect was smutty and all together off-putting.

"You look like you just got off the corner."

"I told you I had a lax job."

Zexion fought to keep his eyes from widening. Part of him wasn't surprised, but he was shocked that Axel had been so suddenly and blatantly honest.

"Axel. Is it alright if I ask you a question?"

"Other than that one?" He laughed. "Sure. Shoot."

"Well – have you ever – known someone who didn't feel anything at all? Or tried not to?"

"Sure."

"What happens to them?"

He raised an eyebrow. "What brought this on?"

"Well, Demyx – he's a patient at Castle…"

He was cut off as Axel suddenly leapt up, knocking his chair to the ground with a loud, ringing clatter. "You know Demyx?"

"Do you?"

"Myede?" Zexion nodded. Axel righted his chair and sank into it slowly. "Yeah. I guess there couldn't be more than one Demyx around here, y'know? Where is he? How's he doing? I mean, I haven't seen him in years."

"Did you not hear me? He's a patient at Castle Memorial. He is dying from AIDS."

And for the first time, he saw a genuinely crestfallen expression cross his visitor's thin face. "What a shame. What a real, damn shame. He was such a good kid. I mean, compared to some of the others."

Zexion stared in disbelief. Axel and Demyx knew each other. He supposed he shouldn't be surprised, thought he was past the point of being shocked, what with all that had occurred recently.

_What the hell is happening to my life? _He thought. That he felt panic only made him panic even more. _Calm, _he attempted to remind himself, _stay calm and feel nothing. _

Axel coughed awkwardly. "So who was that blonde kid you were talking to at the bar?"

"That's Roxas."

"He's cute."

"No, Axel." He said, tone sharp, though he wondered why it mattered. Axel was grown and could pursue whomever he chose. "Look – if you want to see Demyx, you can come to the hospital with me tomorrow."

"Yeah. I think I'd like that. Give me your address and I'll pick you up."

**.x.**

Axel left at ten, and Zexion closed the café up early. He was so tired, the kind of tired that permeated through every fiber of his being. _Weary. _He was weary and he wanted to go home; he felt sick, but the sickness was not in his stomach. It was somewhere, tight and heavy, in his chest.

Thought Axel had offered to give him a ride in his old beater car, he'd refused, and walked home now through the ice and slush. Things had stopped making sense a while ago. He was tired of trying.

When he arrived home, he found Larxene sitting on the couch, idly flipping through the television channels. She looked at him when he walked in.

"You're early."

"Yeah."

"Are you alright?"

"…no." he admitted. He sat down next to her, taking off his gloves; apparently the honesty and content of his answer had surprised her enough to banish any last traces of ill feeling she'd felt towards him. She stared at him, as if waiting for elaboration. "Something's wrong with me, Larxene. I mean something is very wrong."

"Maybe your heart is growing three sizes."

"Have you been watching The Grinch again?"

"Yep. It just ended." She patted her lap. Against his better judgment, he laid down and rested his head when she'd indicated. Her hands began to gently pet his hair, handling each lock with care. "So what's wrong?"

"I just don't feel….right."

"Well, you aren't." He swatted her leg lightly. "Seriously, Zex – and I say this with the utmost sympathy – you are one fucked up little boy."

"I'm not a little boy."

"Aren't you? Underneath all your bravado and cool fronts you're nothing but a scared little kid. Maybe you're just growing up. And trust me, growing up is a bitch."

He sighed idly and entertained the idea that she may be right. Though he couldn't picture himself as a child and thought that he had long since exited the closet he'd hid himself in as a boy, outgrown childish things – the need for love, for approval, for a home. Without those things the world was cold, but he thought that the world was a cold place to live.

There was a knock on the door.

"I'll get it." Zexion said. He stood up and crossed the living room, opened the door. The woman on the other side sent a fierce growl ripping from his throat.

"Mother?"


	8. Day Seven

**A/N: **Another reasonably timely update? What is this?

It's Day Seven is what! We are now officially one third of the way through _Trains and Sewing Machines. _This chapter is a little – er, insane. But it's Zexy, so what else?

If you review, you get an e-cookie. Who doesn't want an e-cookie?

* * *

**~ Phobia (life is like a speeding car – sometimes you have to BREAK) ~**

* * *

For a long, blissful moment, Zexion stared and didn't feel anything at all. He stared at the woman on the other side of the door, his mother, petite and with a veritable mass of blonde curls that cascaded over her shoulders. Only when he looked at her did he realize how closely he resembled his father; a small part of him prayed that he wasn't really her son, though he knew that this was unrealistic. There were pictures to prove it.

"Zexy!"

The moment she spoke, cold rage flooded his mind and body. His blood suddenly seemed to be coursing through his veins at absolute zero.

"Zexy? Say something."

"Don't call me that." He said, his tone as icy as when she had told him not to call her mother.

"I'm your mother and I will call you whatever I feel like. Can't I come in?"

"No."

"But don't you love me?"

"No." He said again. "I haven't loved you for many years."

She growled. It was a low, feral sound, and if he hadn't know better he wouldn't have believed it could come from such a small woman. He had hardly an instant to comprehend what the sound meant before she lashed out; her nails struck his face and ripped three even gauges into his cheek.

"That's no way to talk to your mother." She said. Though her tone was falsely sweet and slightly stern, as if she were reprimanding a child, the words and feeling were venomous. _Viper_, he thought. She cracked her knuckles and he was certain she would strike him again. She placed her hand on the side of his neck in a way that might be perceived as gentle and loving, and stood up on her toes to whisper in his ear.

"Why don't you love me?"

He felt her nails – those terrible, biting, acrylic _weapons _– tear through the soft flesh of his neck slowly. He closed his eyes and wondered if she was going to take make literal the phrase 'go for the jugular', pictured her digging and searching almost surgically for that vein and -

She cried out suddenly. His eyes flew open. She was several feet away from him now, and Larxene stood between them, her arms crossed over her chest.

"Stay the hell away from him." She said, and slammed the door. Larxene, who had always maintained that he should be kinder to his mother, that they should make up. Zexion was stunned. Larxene was nearly panting with anger.

He walked away and went into the kitchen, opening the refrigerator door. His heart had kicked into double (triple) time, and for one surreal moment he thought he wouldn't be able to catch his breath again. Perhaps, he thought, he would hyperventilate and fall, spin slowly into some dark place, unraveling – although he was certain that he was unraveling already.

Deciding to forego cranberry juice, he slammed the door shut and unscrewed the cap from the bottle of vodka he kept on the counter. He drank it straight from the neck and hardly winced at the acrid taste. Lord, but that burn was good. He slid down to sit on the kitchen floor with his back against the cabinets.

It was only a moment before Larxene cast her shadow over him. He expected a witty remark about how achingly pathetic he knew he must look, but instead he received:

"Holy fuck, Zex, you're bleeding."

He was. He knew he was. He could feel red ribbons of blood sliding slowly down his face and neck, could see the bright splashes on the white tile floor.

"Shut the fuck up." He muttered. He fumbled for a cigarette with shaking hands and after some time, longer than it should have taken, he managed to light it, and looked up at Larxene over the burning ember.

"Let me clean -

"No. It's perfectly fucking alright." He snapped, and took another swig of vodka. The look in her eyes was so truly sympathetic that he couldn't bear it, and if she would just stop looking at him, god, stop _looking _at him like that he thought that maybe he could pull himself together and stop thinking about it. About the way his mother had show up. Her toxic presence. How Larxene had stepped in and defended him as if they were actually _friends_ instead of two people living together and splitting rent, trading favors.

He drained the bottle of its last drops of alcohol and stood up. "You'll have to get some more vodka." He said. He tossed the empty bottle across the room. It hit the wall and shattered. He stood up, retreated into his room, and locked the door, leaving Larxene to clean up the mess.

**.x.**

It was the kind of morning in which he woke up itching for a cigarette before he even opened his eyes. His sleep had not been peaceful, or dreamless. Instead it had been filled with the monsters of memories, simple things picked at and twisted until they were mutant ghosts haunting his sleep.

He reached for the pack by his bed, blindly pulled a cigarette out, and lit it; only after a few drags did he find the strength to open his eyes. It was 7:27. The morning light seemed unforgiving.

_Axel will be here soon_, he remembered suddenly. He sat up and forced himself out of bed. Ugly streaks of dried blood – a reddish brown in color – stood in contrast to the gray sheets and violet pillowcases in the place where he'd laid his head and neck. Both were sore, and he was fairly sure that he couldn't hide the wounds with some skillfully applied makeup.

A glance in the mirror confirmed this. The part of him that was arrogant and narcissistic cringed – even once he washed away the blood, he was left with three harsh caverns carved across the smooth landscape of his face. The injury on his neck was more painful but less noticeable. He covered it with a black turtleneck.

He didn't feel like seeing Larxene, so he sent her a text message: _you don't have to give me a ride this morning. _

Almost as if on cue, there was a knock on the door. Zexion jumped despite being certain that it was Axel.

And he was right.

Axel, whose knock was loud and demanding, stood on the other side of the door, dressed in frayed jeans and a faded band tee.

"I see you've dropped the hooker gear." Zex said calmly.

"It's daylight, y'know. What the hell happened to your face?"

"I'd rather not discuss that." He said. Hearing the darkness in his tone, Axel pressed no further, and was uncharacteristically silent as they walked to the car. It was an old Honda Accord that seemed to be made of chipped paint and rust; the headliner was falling down, held to the roof by a few strategically placed staples, and burn holes from cigarettes littered the whole interior. The ashtray was overflowing with butts.

Zexion climbed in after Axel had reached over to unlock his door. He hadn't expected the quiet to last any length of time, so he wasn't surprised when Axel pressed play on the cassette played and flooded the car with the sound of Nirvana's _Nevermind. _He sighed and took out a cigarette. _I should cut back_, he thought briefly as he lit it, then, _No. Fuck it._And next to him, Axel was wailing to Lithium.

"_I like it, I'm not gonna crack!" _He sang at the top of his lungs. His voice wasn't unpleasant but the words struck something somewhere deep inside Zexion, and he reached over, cutting the sound.

"Hey, man, what –

"I don't like that song." He said softly. "Besides, we're almost to the hospital…"

"Okay, yeah, cool." Axel said. They arrived at Castle Memorial just a few moments later.

"Good morning, Zex!" Kairi chirped cheerfully, which made his stomach churn. "How was your –

She stopped midsentance, her expression suddenly stunned and horrified with traces of that god-awful sympathy.

"What _happened?_"

He stalked past her with Axel dogging his heels. He changed into uniform, and paid no attention to the stares he received as he led his companion up to Demyx's room. It was still unbelievable to him that the two should know each other, but he thought he shouldn't be so surprised. After all, had he expected that Demyx, an AIDS patient, had lived a normal and sane life? If his math was right, Zexion deduced that Dem had been diagnosed when he was fourteen. He found himself wondering what Demyx's life had been like, what legacy he would leave behind.

_Stop it, _he snapped at himself.

"This is the room." He said when they had come to a stop outside of 669. He pushed the door open.

"I brought you a visitor, Demyx."

Blue eyes widened in surprise and – shit, was that _fear? _Zexion wondered suddenly if he'd made a mistake by bringing Axel. But when he let Axel into the room, Demyx's expression changed completely. His pale lips pulled back into a smile, his eyes lit up, and he quickly pulled himself into a sitting position.

_"Ax?"_

**.x.**

Axel settled into the chair next to Demyx's bed. Zexion had left, claiming that he had other things to do and promising Demyx he'd be back to read to him within the hour. It was definitely strange to see the kid dressed in clinical white from head to toe; the hospital was the last place he would have expected to see Zexion working. He could see him as a patient, yeah, a suicide attempt (a thought which surprised him, when had Zex ever done anything to indicate that? But Axel felt that Zexion was deeply unhappy, unhappy enough to purposefully find himself on the wrong end of a gun). But, as a volunteer? He didn't get it. Even as community service.

"Wow, Axel, I'm so – like, whoa, I mean – I'm really, really happy that you came, but – how did you find me? How did you know I was here? Did…_he _tell you?"

Axel shook his head. "No. I haven't seen him in a hell of a long time. Zexy out there is a friend of mine. He said something about you, and – yeah."

It was nice to see Demyx again. It had been so long. But he hated, truly hated, the circumstance of their reunion, the disease eating someone he had once been very close to – he could remember back to when Dem was just a kid. Before AIDS, when Demyx's cheeks were rosy and full of laughter instead of pale and gaunt. He wanted to ask how he'd been, but it seemed pretty obvious. He looked at his friend and just hated it.

He found himself speechless. Demyx noticed.

"You're being quiet, Ax. Do I look that bad?" He grinned. "You're always saying something."

"Yeah, you know how I much I love to hear the sound of my own voice."

"You really do. But hey, don't let my, uh, condition deter you. Tell me how the hell you've been."

"Well, let's see…I've got my own apartment now. Shitty little place, but it's mine, or at least it is as long as I'm paying rent. Uhm…I've gotten pretty decent at play my guitar, got an old pieceashit Honda, had a couple girls and boys here and there but it never really worked out. That's like, the past four years in a nutshell."

"And you haven't talked to –

"Naw. Saw him once like two years ago. He came up to me and patted me on the back, you know, the 'son, old buddy, ol' pal' routine, and I'm like yeah, great, you were like our dad or something but I'm kind of busy right now, talk to you later. What about you? I mean –

"He comes into visit me sometimes. Well. Rarely." At this, Demyx's normally cheerful expression became disturbed, dark, sad. His brows pulled together as if he were trying to think too hard about something. It made the sight of him worse, more horrific – when Dem was smiling it was easier to overlook his sunken face… "I think it's just like, an obligation or something for him."

"Aw, Dem, cheer up. He's a bastard, right? We don't need him. I'll come see you all the time, okay?"

Demyx smiled again, which made Axel smile, too. He'd never considered himself the most reliable of guys, but he knew he'd keep his promise and visit Dem. Often. It wasn't fair that _he _wouldn't even give the blonde the time of day, even when this was undoubtedly his fault.

**.x.**

Zexion entered the room an hour after he'd left Axel there, just like he'd said he would. After seeing how happy his patient had been, he'd stopped thinking that he made a mistake. He'd been sorely tempted to eavesdrop with his ear to the door, but had tried to force himself not to care about what they were saying and besides, he'd look ridiculous if Kairi or Sora happened by.

"Okay, well." Axel said, "I'll leave you two alone, where can I –

"Roxas is in the cafeteria."

"Which is?"

"First floor, follow the signs."

Axel leapt up, long legs eager and green eyes alight with the prospect of talking to a cute blonde. He stopped at the door. "Bye, Dems." He said. "I'll be back soon, okay?"

And in the next instant, he was gone. Zexion sighed heavily and eased himself into the chair Axel had just vacated. He stared at Demyx and Demyx stared back. With one thin hand he reached out and touched the gashes on Zexion's cheek. He said nothing. His eyes were soft.

For a very long time they sat there, just like that, silent. Too silent, too still. If it weren't for the pulse fluttering like mockingbirds beneath the skin of Demyx's fingertips, he would have wondered whether he was still alive, wonder if the patient had died before the remaining time allotted to him.

Touch was a powerful thing.

Violent touches, tender touches, the absence of any touch at all. These things could change a life. At the present moment, beneath Dem's touch, he felt something rising up in his chest and threatening to choke him out. He wanted to pick up the book and read and lose the feeling. But he found himself paralyzed.

"What happened?" Demyx finally asked, voice gentle.

"My mother." He said. Once again he was horrified by how soft and broken his voice sounded. He didn't explain anything. But the look in Demyx's eyes seemed to say that those two words spoke for themselves. Zexion cursed himself for being so honest. But in that moment, with the light coming in through the window and underneath the most tender and compassionate of touches, he found that he did not need to lie.

**.x.**

Axel was surprisingly kind enough to keep the radio off in the car. Zexion didn't say anything, but he wasn't sure which was worse: the sound of the music or the sound of his own thoughts. Much to his alarm, the horrible, choking feeling hadn't left when he departed from Demyx's room, and it remained as he sat in Axel's car.

_Fuck my life. _He lit a cigarette. The feeling did not subside even after several hard drags. He felt something wet stinging his eyes and he blinked furiously because everything in him rebelled against the idea. _Not that – _and he couldn't even pretend that his thoughts weren't panicked, desperate – _No. No._He hadn't cried since he was very, very young.

"How…did it go with Roxas?" He didn't particularly care, but he would do anything to prevent those tears…

Axel smiled. "He's cute. A little shy, but it's kind of totally fucking adorable, y'know? The way he looks up at you through those lashes….mmm. It's _divine_. I got his phone number, so."

"That's…good?"

"Fucking great. And it's not like I just sat there hitting on him for an hour, we actually talked, he's got this really interesting theory on – hey, man, are you okay?"

To Zexion's horror, the wetness had welled up and was threatening to spill over. He struggled to speak, to answer Axel, but he opened his mouth and the foundation on which he'd built his life dropped out. A sob tore from his throat instead of the words he'd hope to speak. He felt like he was falling. Like the world was ending, an apocalypse in his small body, Armageddon in his head.

Axel stared, his mouth open. He had no idea what to do about the kid having a mental breakdown in the passenger seat of his car. He'd known from the day they'd met that Zex would go off his rocker, but he'd never thought it would happen so suddenly….and in _his_ car. Zexion seemed like he would suffer ailently and privately. Not so openly like this.

"Zex, give me your cell phone."

The sobbing boy fumbled for his phone and handed it to Axel, who began to search through the contacts. What had the kid said his roommate's name was? Lucky? Larceny?

"Fuck." He muttered, trying to search faster.

_Larxene._There, that was it. He pressed the call button and waited; it rang three times before she answered.

"What?" Her voice was sharp and cold and seemed to be made of it's own static electricity.

"Larxene?"

"Who the hell is this?"

"Uh, okay, hi. My name's Axel –

"Oh, you're the guy that Zex has been -

"Yeah. Look, about Zex. He's kind of having a small mental breakdown in my car right now."

"Fuck!" She yelled. His spine tingled at the sound, as if she had struck him through the phone. "I'm at fucking _work. _Look, just take him to the apartment – I'll get there."

**.x.**

Axel met Larxene at roughly 3pm when she entered the living room of her apartment, while Zexion was curled up on the couch in a tight ball. For one moment their eyes met, but she looked away and walked right over to the couch.

Her presence was like her voice, electric and unforgiving. He wondered what it would be like to feel her underneath his hands, moving, rocking.

He'd always had a thing for blondes with blue eyes.

**.x.**

_**I don't want those bad things to happen to you, too.**_

_Too late. Too fucking late, Demyx, didn't you know that it was too late for me? You knew everything, you had to know_

(_slick red blood all over pristine tiles, everything so - )_

_You had to know, why did you do this to me? And now I'm – I'll never come out of this, nothing has ever hurt so -_

_(and red blooming bright against blonde ringlets, everywhere - )_

_bad, Demyx, it is painful, so very painful to do this, my -_

_(his father standing over her, eyes foggy and burning with rage)_

_heart is breaking my heart is shattering_

_(she was going to kill him that night)_

_I can't_

_(until his father - )_

_I like it, I'm not gonna crack -_

_( - cracked her skill and she's bleeding it's everywhere - )_

_I kill you, I'm not gonna crack_

_(and he wonders if she's going to die)_

_Bad things are happening, have always happened, and I_

_(packed his stuff and left the house)_

_can't do this anymore, I am such a_

_(showed up at Larxene's doorstep while the paramedics took his mother)_

_coward, I am a fake and a liar and a fool, I am_

_(and told her not to ask any questions)_

_Nothing._

_(started drinking)_

_I am_

_(until he passed out on her kitchen floor)_

_Nothing_

_(And she put him into bed and held back his hair and he pretended that it never happened, just another night, been drinking for a while now and nobody put him in bed or held back his hair before and if his mother thought it was weird that he was passed out on the floor or sick a lot she pretended that it wasn't)_

_I am nothing._

_(and a month later he had gotten drunk and wrapped his car around a light pole)_

_I am nothing_

_( he doesn't remember if he was trying to die.)_

_I am nothing._


	9. Day Eight

A/N: The chapter in which this fic vigorously earns its 'M' rating. Ehehehe.

There's a quote in the third section, right before Zexion enters the café ("There's nothing you can take from me…" etc., etc.). I will take a request from the first person to correctly identify the quote (that is, the name of the work it came from, who said it - and if you know, the scene, though that part isn't necessary). So, have fun, enjoy the read, ID the quote aaaand….you guessed it, review!

* * *

**~Awake (And All the King's Horses and All the King's Men….)~**

* * *

Larxene lifted Zexion – as thin and petite as he was – from the couch and cradled his shaking figure to her body. Axel watched and felt both intrigued and awkward. He wouldn't have guessed that a woman whose presence was as sharp and static as hers could handle anything with such tender care.

"I'm going to put him to bed." She announced quietly. The softness in her eyes didn't match up with the rest of her, though he had a feeling that the relationship between her and Zexion was more like mother to child than anything else. She disappeared into the hallway and did not reappear for several minutes. He looked around the apartment. It was small, but modern and stylish. He wondered who had arranged the décor.

When Larxene emerged, her eyes bore an expression he found much more fitting. He leaned against the back of the couch and lit a cigarette.

"So," she said. Her _tone_ seemed to smirk, and was slightly amused. "Your name is Axel and you're in my living room. Want a beer?"

"Yeah, I'll take one."

She opened the fridge and tossed him a can of Heineken. He caught it, popped it open, and took a long swig.

"So," he said, parroting her smug tone, "Your name is Larxene and you have blue eyes and you drink Heineken. Anything else I should know?"

"I'm a good fuck."

"Classy." He said. He couldn't help a laugh. "Is that an invitation?"

"It could be. You know, if you play your cards right."

He quirked an eyebrow and took another drink. She moved closer but stopped just short of touching him, instead perching on the back of the couch a foot or so away. He caught her scent, which was something like lavender and spent firecrackers.

A twelve pack of beer and one witty conversation later, kissing her seemed perfectly logical. She responded immediately, dug her nails into the fabric of his shirt, and he was sure she was about to rip it off. There was no reason for any of it. But Axel was not a creature of reason, and besides, she was pretty like a lightning strike and she was there and she wanted him. So it was easy.

He slid out of his shirt and tossed it unceremoniously across the room.

She ran her hands along his ribs. He pushed her lightly, toppling her over the edge and onto the couch; he leapt over to join her in one nimble move.

"You…"

"Bastard? Yeah. Got it. Now let me focus."

She obliged. And for a long time they were nothing but lips and legs, hips and thighs, and tangled mess of bodies. He pulled her blouse up over her head and attacked the skin at the hollow of her neck. She gasped. Her heart fluttered underneath his mouth.

"Condom." He muttered.

"In my purse."

He slid off of her and walked to the kitchen table, a difficult and painful venture in and of itself. He spilled the contents of her small black bag out over the surface of the table and, just for a moment, balked at the sheer amount of variety. Clearly the woman was prepared for any situation. He picked up a small, shining package, ripped off the wrapping and his pants, pulled the latex over his throbbing erection.

It occurred to him briefly that screwing his friend's roommate was not the best idea. The thought was banished when he returned to the couch to find Larxene had slipped out of her pants and lay, gloriously nude, waiting for him. She smirked at him and tilted her hips up.

He needed no more invitation.

When he pushed into her, there was no sense of completion, no feeling of puzzle pieces coming together. It was not beautiful, it was not love. It was hot and fast and dirty and crude as he thrust into her rhythmically, his hands underneath her hips while she rocked in nearly perfect time.

"Oh – holy.." She rasped out as he hit that _spot_, that _ohgoditfeelssofuckinggood – _"Axel!" She shrieked.

In the room down the hallway, Zexion woke.

**.x.**

He emerged from the darkness and sprang to life as dawn bled pink into the night sky. For a moment, there was nothing, and then – feeling. It rushed into him like music, strains and notes and instruments overlapping, mixing. It was like running frozen hands under a hot stream of water.

He tried to separate and identify, classify, make sense of these new sensations.

There was sadness, deep and mellow and aching. Pain, red and angry like an infected wound. A landscape of brokenness, rifts and caverns of the soul. Hatred, a black and starless sky…

And then sound flooded back.

"Axel!" He heard Larxene scream. It took a few moment to register; he hardly ever paid attention to her sex cries. But then it dawned on him. It was….

He pressed his face into his pillow and screamed until his lungs could no longer sustain it. He remembered that he had been riding in Axel's car, remembered the feeling of slowly falling apart as it reached it's terrible climax, and how he had known a sudden, bright agony. He had only the faintest memory of being helped into the apartment and laid in bed.

And now Axel was fucking his best friend senseless in the living room. Which was just _fantastic, _he thought wryly as he slipped out of bed.

Though he had been out for an afternoon and an entire night, he felt as though he hadn't slept at all. He contemplated calling in to the hospital, but decided against it; he didn't want to drag out his community service and besides…there was someone he wanted, needed to see.

A wave of dizziness crashed into him as he entered the bathroom. He staggered forward and gripped the edges of the sink, squeezed his eyes shut and prayed for it to pass. His stomach churned. He was sick.

He turned the faucet on to rinse the sink out and looked into the mirror. He wasn't surprised to find that he looked like shit – pale, drawn, his eyes puffy and red from crying. The three tears in his cheek looked angry.

He turned the faucet off and the shower on, cranking the hot water all way up. Steam billowed out and mercifully fogged his reflection. Very slowly, and with shaking hands, he removed his clothes. He winced as the fabric of his turtleneck was torn from the neck wound where fibers had clung.

The hot water felt something like a miracle as it ran over his skin. He sank down and curled up in the corner of the shower, drew his knees to his chest, and stayed there until the water ran cold.

He dressed and went into the living room, where the scent of sex hung so heavily in the air he nearly gagged again. Larxene and Axel were sprawled out on the couch. They'd pulled an old blanket over their naked bodies, for which Zexion was immensely grateful. He'd seen enough of Larxene's body to last him a lifetime.

He left, decided to the walk to Castle.

That night, he thought, he was going to get very, very drunk, and lay in bed doing nothing but attempting to drown out the sickening rush of feeling. He hoped Larxene remembered to buy more vodka. While his false ID was as good as the one he'd made for her, he'd forgotten his and he knew that after the hospital and a shift at the café, he wouldn't be in the mood to leave the apartment again once he arrived.

He ignored Kairi and Sora as per usual, but nodded to Roxas when he saw him carrying a meal tray.

When he entered Demyx's room, he found that the patient was not staring out at the water, but gazing at the doorway expectantly.

"Zex." He said, so softly and gently that Zexion began to tremble and feared that he would cry right on the spot. "Come here." He scooted over in the bed.

Zexion forced his shaking legs forward, hesitantly propelled himself to the hospital bed. He crawled in. It was a snug fit, and he could feel the thinness of Dem's eaten body against his. "I was lying." He whispered, "When I said my mother never hurt me."

"I know." Thin hands played with his hair. It had a soothing effect. "The first time I met you, I could see how much pain you were in. I can still see it. But I don't know how to help you…"

"Nobody can help me. I can't be fixed. I'm a – I'm broken like the glass from the picture frames…." _Like mother's acrylic nails. Shattered by the force of blows._

"That's not true."

"It is."

"You're more than what you think you are, you know, you are. I see that."

"You aren't a psychic."

"No. And I'm not real smart, either, I mean not in the way most people think. I just – I read people well, had to use that to survive and I – I know that you're more than what you think."

For a moment, everything seemed to freeze – it was not in the same way as when he had seen his mother, but more as if the world had simply ceased its turning. He could hear his heart pounding and was certain Demyx could as well.

He had never heard anything like that before. _More than what you think you are._

Someone…_believed _in him?

_Him? _

It was impossible. He was nothing and no one.

He began to cry silently and shamelessly. He'd long since invested in the idea that hope was complete and utter bullshit, a lie, but there it was. Glimmering faintly in the distance like the sun off the water. _Hope. _Hope was terrifying. And it was an illusion, he was sure, for the one person who believed in him would be dead within the month.

"It's going to be alright." Dem whispered, wrapped his arms around Zexion and held him.

"How can you say that when you're going to _die?_"

" That's alright, too, Zex, it is, because I'm tired and my body hurts. I know….that I'll be way better off where I go after, so…" He shrugged slightly. The laid there for a while, quiet save for Zexion's sobs, but eventually they began to subside.

"I'm such a fucking wreck." He muttered.

"If you wanna tell me…"

"You're not a therapist, either."

"Like you'd go to one anyway? Besides, listening's another survival skill."

"Right." He sucked in a deep breath and debated whether or not to tell Demyx. He'd never told it all, intentionally, outright – Larxene knew because she had deduced from his episodes and he'd grudgingly filled in blanks along the way. To tell would be to trust. Trust, like hope, was frightening, only it was far more dangerous. Because trust, when broken, could shatter you.

It took only an instant to remember that he was already shattered. And aside from that, part of him….really wanted to trust Dem, wanted to – believe in something. Because he feared that if he did not, if he stayed in this pit of devastating despair and impossible pain with nothing to grab on to, that his newfound feelings would bury him alive.

"It's not a very exciting story. Only that my father met a society girl whom he fell in love with and married, and she corrupted him. My whole life I listened to them fight fiercely and with no regard for each other or for me. But they covered up their bruises and acted, to the public they were so infatuated with, as if our life were perfect. The older I became the more my mother hated me. What a bitter, wretched woman she is. She couldn't stand that I was becoming a man. And things went downhill, until – well, I'd rather not discuss that yet, but I moved in with Larxene, my best friend…"

There was a long, deep silence, though it was not uncomfortable. Demyx's hands had strayed from his hair and now rubbed his neck and shoulders lightly. He shifted to rest his head against his patient's chest because he decided that he'd rather hear Dem's heartbeat than his own.

So this was what it was like to be close to someone. It was kind of nice.

"And now you drink."

"Yeah."

"A lot."

Zexion flinched. "Yeah."

"Why?"

"Because it is total numbness. I am bothered by nothing."

"Ah. I kinda figured that. Like I said before, I knew some people like you."

"What happened to them?"

"They died."

_Doesn't sound remarkably far off, _Zexion thought darkly. But in the next moment Demyx had caught him with his blue eyes and for that instant he could think nothing at all.

"I don't want that to happen to you." He reiterated softly. His lips grazed Zexion's forehead. "And I think you've got a chance to change it."

**.x.**

The train cried out as he walked to the café.

It raced down the track in a powerful rhythm both steady and frantic, which Zexion immediately likened to the feelings of his heart and mind. He allowed himself to fantasize about riding that beast of a machine somewhere, anywhere else – New York or Seattle or Boston or a cargo unloading station in the middle of nowhere. Just somewhere else. Somewhere outside his own life.

Perhaps, he thought suddenly, he'd buy a ticket when this whole candy striping affair was over with.

Hope glittered menacingly in the near distance.

Hope, that treacherous thing which existed so deeply and irrationally inside Demyx even when his situation was hopeless by definition, would either restore him or grind him into dust. But he had nothing left to lose.

_"There is nothing you could take from me I would more willingly part withal – except my life, except my life, except my life."_

The quote jumped out from the pages of his mind, remembered suddenly and strikingly. He sighed, entered the café, and relieved Xion.

When business slowed and the place seemed dead for the night, Zexion crept into the book section and sat, leaned back against one of the shelves. He liked to sit among the books. Sometimes he felt as though they spoke to him, stilled for a second his restless soul.

It seemed, however, that no such relief would come that night.

"Won't someone just tell me what to do?" He said out loud, to the universe if he'd said it to anyone at all.

Nothing happened. No book fell from the shelves, miraculously turned to the perfect page; no visitor walked through the door blessed with the right answer or timely, sage advice. Nothing. He was alone.

He picked a Bible from the shelves. He had burned one, once, the Catholic Bible his imperfect parents had given him when he was eight and force fed to him his entire life. He had burned it in their backyard and watched with gleeful exaltation as flames consumed the book and turned it to ashes. It was the only time he had ever treated a piece of literature so brutally.

He wasn't sure why he'd picked it up. Perhaps, he thought, he was feeling particularly masochistic, or perhaps he wanted to stew in the bitterness and hatred that he was comfortable with. He did not allow himself to think that he might be searching for comfort.

He flipped through the pages until he came across Psalm 23. He remembered it from many services, and so he stopped, began to read.

"_The Lord is my shepherd  
I shall not want  
He makes me lie down in green pastures  
He leads me beside still waters for His name's sake.  
Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death  
I shall fear no evil, for You are with me – "_

In one swift move, he threw the Bible across the room. "Fuck you!" He screamed. "Nobody's with me! No one! Even the universe doesn't fucking take my requests! My own _body_ doesn't listen to me! Go fuck yourself, life, you cruel bitch, you – " He stopped himself with a gasp, his hands covering his mouth in crude horror. He sounded like his mother. Like his _mother. _Feeling as though he could not stand, he crawled on his hands and knees to where he'd thrown the Scripture. He picked it up, clutched it to his chest, and fell on his side. He gasped for air. He couldn't breathe.

It wasn't long before everything dimmed and faded.

**.x.**

He came to in the glaring brightness of a hospital. For a long time, he couldn't fathom why he would be there, and flat on his back. But then it rushed back – the Bible and the Café, hyperventilating.

Well, shit.

The doctor came in, asked him some questions, disappeared, reappeared with some stress reduction tips, and turned him loose. Zexion started to head for the door, but an idea struck him; he looped back.

Visiting hours were up, but he could sneak through the corridors he'd come to know well and see Demyx.

So he did just that. He slipped through the hallways and up flights of stairs until he reached room 669. When he pushed the door open, he found Demyx awake, and – to his faint surprise – watching _Friends _reruns.

Demyx turned to look at him. He didn't seem phased by the fact that Zexion was standing his room far past the allotted time for visitors, but simply slid over in the bed. Zex crawled in. They were quiet. They watched the television and cuddled, content with each other's company. And as Zexion began to fall asleep to the rhythm of Demyx's heartbeat, he realized that something even more dangerous than hope and trust was growing, unbidden, between them.


	10. Day Nine

**A/N: **Alright, alright, alright! We're rolling, kids XD. Day Nine, coming up. By the way, congrats to **writesinthunder **for winning the challenge, and the answer was (~ imaginary drumroll~) Hamlet, Act II, Scene II, spoken to Polonius by Hamlet himself.

Definitely have to give a shout out to **luckless-is-me **and **Dream Me Asleep. **You guys are awesome, seriously, for sticking with this thing and reviewing every chapter. Your time is much appreciated, so thanks :)

Alright, enough rambling, right? Right.

On to Day Nine!

* * *

**~Falling (Falser than Vows Made in Wine)~**

* * *

Zexion was experiencing the deepest natural sleep he'd had in many, many years when he was roused by a hand gently shaking his shoulder. He whimpered in protest and attempted to jerk away. He'd been dreaming, not having a nightmare but really _dreaming_, and he wished, yearned to return to the safety and beauty of it. He didn't think about where he was or who could be shaking him or the warm body breathing deeply against his. He just wanted to go back sleep.

"Hey, Zexion, get up."

The voice was Roxas' and the sound of it was enough to shock him awake. His eyes flew open and met with the wall of white and green fabric that made up Castle's hospital gowns – in this case, Demyx's. Memories of the night before flooded his mind. It was like being submerged in a tub of ice cold water. He waited for the panic to come.

But he felt nothing except for the slight concern of being caught somewhere he ought not to have been, and disconcerting feeling that flittered in his ribcage like a trapped flock of sparrows. He was intrigued and alarmed by it both. But with Roxas urging him to get up and _move_, he decided to examine it later.

He slipped down to the lobby and into his uniform without much notice. Somehow the day felt different, as if he had actually woken up instead of just transitioned from one miserable state of living to another. He wondered if it had something to do with the fact that he'd slept instead of passed out, and if it was because he'd dreamed.

It wasn't so unusual for him to think of Demyx anymore, so when he began to mull over the previous night as he handed mail out, he wasn't altogether surprised. What he was surprised by was how…_nice _it had been. To lay close to someone and listen to their heartbeat as if his own had depended on it, to breathe in and out together. To be with someone who believed in him, had hope for him. But Dem would be gone soon, and then -

Zexion thought that he would find out just how quickly he could fall apart. How violently and terribly, losing the only person who believed he could be more, the only person who he liked.

Although, to be fair, he could acknowledge on the other side of that cold void that he liked Larxene. She was his best friend. He liked Axel, too (and apparently, those two liked each other a little too much, but he didn't even want to think on that).

So if what he felt towards Demyx was more (much) more than what he felt for Axel or Larxene, stronger and gentler and tender and desperate and _warm_, too large to be contained in his small body, then what in the hell _was _it?

He refused to let it be love.

Because Demyx, he thought bitterly as he stepped outside for a cigarette, was too good for love. Love was a lie, and wherever it existed it maimed and killed, corrupted and destroyed, betrayed and wounded. Demyx didn't deserve that. He was above it.

Zexion figured that with the way love had screwed him, the way he hated it, it would be just his luck to catch it (because yes, it was just like a disease). For someone who would die, no less.

But he refused, for Demyx's sake, to let it be love.

He tilted his head back to rest against the drab concrete wall. He looked up at the sky, wide above him, grey and weak with winter. He wasn't sure if he liked this change within himself or not – before, at least, everything had been logical (if cold) and sane (if lonely) and simple (if empty). Now, everything was complicated (but warm) and nothing made sense.

For a long time he sat like that and tried to be as blank as possible.

Eventually, he pulled himself to his feet and went back inside, up the stairs, and his heart – newly alive – seemed to be a magnetic force of its own, dragging him towards the opposite pole. Towards that thing which differed from himself so greatly, yet drew him, and he nearly shuddered inside for fear of the force of it, but soon he was inside the room and staring at Demyx. And Demyx was staring back in a way that made him feel like his bones would separate and he would fall to the floor and weep. Unable to stand in the presence of this _feeling_.

When he felt that he could walk again, he crawled into the bed with Dem and laid his head against his chest. He listened to his heartbeat and prayed that it would continue. The feeling was so much, so strong, so all around that he didn't think he knew who he was, didn't know what was happening and didn't care.

He looked into Demyx's eyes.

Demyx looked back. Zexion parted his lips and leaned in, touched their lips together; Dem's lips were soft and chapped in places, thin, and they responded to his.

It was the only kiss Zexion ever had that had meant something.

Too soon, Demyx pulled back. "We can't do that." He whispered softly, gently. "It's not that I don't want to, I do, but I – I'm sick, you know, and if – if you have any open sores in your mouth or – "

"I don't."

"How can I risk it? I can't, not when I lov – "

"I pray thee," Zexion said, quoted from _As You Like It, _"do not fall in love with me, for I am falser than vows made in wine."

"Zex…."

"Don't. Don't fall in love with me. Love is – love is not good. Love is – love does nothing but hurt."

"Have you ever loved before?"

"No, and for good reason."

"Then you can't say that. I know….I understand….that your parents were really terrible, and they never showed you what love is, but it's like…..it's just like…God is giving you the best he has to offer…"

"Don't talk to me about God, either, please, I can't, I just – I can't – "

"Okay." Demyx said quietly. He pulled Zexion into his arms, and stroked his hair. "Okay, it's okay. I love you and I promise you that things are going to be okay."

**.x.**

The door creaked open an hour later. Zexion didn't even turn his head from where it rested, but Demyx could see.

"Hey, Axel." He said.

Zex tensed for a moment. He hadn't seen Axel since he'd left the morning before, and at that time, he'd been naked and unconscious under Larxene. So, he didn't know if that particularly counted as _seeing. _It was more like trying _not_ to see.

And he still didn't feel any special inclination to talk to the man.

He reminded himself, then, that he would probably have to deal with Ax no matter what and it really wasn't his business who he, or Larxene, chose to sleep with. Since the sexual interest he held towards either them was less than zero, he knew it wasn't jealousy or hurt.

He decided it was probably more shock and awkwardness than anything, and turned around to look at Axel.

"Larxene's pretty much going out of her mind." Axel said casually. He stuck both of his hands deep into his pockets. "I mean, she called me like four times last night looking for you."

"She's not my mom." He muttered.

"Yeah, I know. But she's still worried. Just thought you might want to know, or call her, or something."

"Are you going to?"

"What?"

"Call her."

"What? Oh, yeah – that. No, that's not going to happen again, I don't think. You know I've got my sights set on Roxy." He shrugged, and nodded at Demyx. "Hey, Dem. Am I interrupting something?"

"No, it's fine." Demyx waved it off. "I'm glad you came back, like you said, I mean – "

"Yeah. No, I get it." He sat down in the chair by the bed. "Promises weren't the strong suit of our bunch."

"You still see any of them? I mean, I know you said you saw _him, _once, but the others?"

"Some of them, yeah. Luxord's still playing cards, but he's doing alright, winning pretty big you know? I'll have a beer with Saix from time to time, too."

"Still beat the hell out of each other on sight?"

"Of course. It's tradition, now."

Zexion listened to them talk. It was a very strange sensation; he didn't feel like they were ignoring him, but rather that they literally didn't care if he heard what they had to say or not. Total openness, unguarded with each other. But Demyx seemed to inspire that in everybody and Axel came to his workplace dressed like a cheap whore, so he supposed it wasn't all that unusual.

As they talked, he found himself wanting to know more. Who Luxord was, and Saix, and why Axel and Saix felt the need to kill each other on sight. What Demyx had been like when Axel knew him, though he doubted he'd changed much. Who the _he_ that they spoke of was.

As questions flooded his mind, Zexion realized for the first time that he cared. He wanted to know about someone else. He wanted into someone's life.

Axel and Demyx continued to talk. They talked rapidly, excited, about things like music and do-you-remember-that-one-time-when- (Axel confirmed that yes, he did remember that time he burned Demyx's eyebrows off, and wasn't that funny?). Zex laid quietly and listened.

"We must be boring the hell out of you." Axel said suddenly.

"No." He said. "I was listening…."

Axel stood up. "Sadly, I must take my leave from you, but – "

"I need to go, too." Zexion very cautiously kissed Dem's forehead and swung out of the hospital bed. Axel promised Demyx that he would be back again, and Zexion promised to come after work. The two of them took the elevator together.

"So you and Demyx…." Axel said.

"Yes." He confirmed. "Though to be honest, I'm not sure about the situation. He tells me today that he loves me. But I've known him less than two weeks."

"Well, do you love him?"

"I don't believe in love."

"That doesn't answer my question." Axel smirked, as if he was winning a game.

"What I feel for Demyx is surely much more than love, though perhaps it is love as he imagines it."

"So there you go. It's possible to fall in love with someone in two seconds, why not a week?"

"I….wouldn't know."

Axel put a hand on his shoulder. "You're learning. It's fine. Dem'll be a great teacher."

They split as they got off the elevator. Axel headed for the door, and Zexion headed for the desk to request permission to stay overnight.

**.x.**

With permission granted, he emerged from the hospital onto the streets. Something soft and cold hit his cheek; he looked up to see flurries of snow drifting from the bleak sky. A smile turned up the corner of his mouth and he stared for a while. How...how perfectly beautiful.

Sleet was much more common in the city, sleet that was cold and frozen and turned into patches of black ice on the roads. Snow, at least while it fell, had the courtesy to be pretty. He stood and enjoyed it.

After some time, he forced himself to move towards the café and debated whether or not to call Larxene. It wasn't that he didn't want to speak with _her_ in particular, it was more that he didn't want to hear what she had to say to him. She would either yell or give him some parental lecture, and he wasn't up for it.

The café was thoroughly dull. He started to reread _A Clockwork Orange _for the seventh time, keeping carefully away from the shelves of books behind and to the side of him, didn't think on what had happened and just read. When his shift was over he reluctantly walked back to his and Larxene's apartment to change clothes.

He fully expected to find her either glaring at the door or having sex with a stranger, but when he entered the apartment he found that she was sitting on the couch – with someone else. He squinted and vaguely remembered him as the man that had been handcuffed to Larxene's seat when she had picked him up from Millennium Park. The man's name escaped him. He was a little shocked that they seemed to be cuddling, but he kind of shrugged it off after a minute. Not much, he thought, would surprise him anymore.

Larxene looked over her shoulder at him. He disappeared into his room, grabbed the duffel bag he had brought all his things from his parent's house in, and methodically packed enough clothes to last him two weeks.

"I'm going to be gone for a while." He announced as he entered the living room. "For a couple of weeks at least."

Larxene turned around to look at him fully. She stared at him for a moment, then nodded. "You'll call me?"

"Yes. I will. I promise." He paused. "Larx, there's a lot of things I have to figure out."

"I know."

"But you're my best friend."

"I know."

"And I care about you. More than I've ever been capable of demonstrating. I'm going to – to maybe get some answers about myself, but – I'll call. And I'll visit, and I'll come back in the end."

She stood up from the couch, walked around, and hugged him tightly. He rubbed her back for a few moments, gave her a quick squeeze, and walked out the door.

**.x.**

With a slight sigh, he dropped his duffel bag on the clean tile floor and sank into the cot he would be sleeping on for the next two weeks. Demyx, who was still awake, turned his head to look at him and grinned.

"So do I get to see you in your pajamas now?" He asked, tone teasing. "Do they have rubber duckies on them? Cause you would look really cute in rubber duckies, just saying."

"I don't wear pajamas. Usually." He rummaged through his bag and pulled out a pair of grey sweatpants, which he went into the bathroom to change into. He folded up his dirty clothes neatly and placed them in a corner of the room.

"You're really skinny, Zex. I can see your ribs. And you're not really gonna sleep on that cot, are ya?"

"Like you're one to talk." He muttered, disgruntled, and climbed into the bed next to Demyx.

"So what did you dream about last night?"

"Huh?"

"Your dream. You talk in your sleep, y'know, or you did last night, so what was it about?"

"…Trains." He said. "I was…..on a train, riding it. On top of it. The wind was in my hair and the sky was….very sharp and clear above me….I felt alive….present in every second of it, in every moment, I…..I have a thing about trains. I suppose it's difficult to explain." His eyes drifted closed, and he pressed in close to Demyx. "Goodnight."

"And good luck." Dem whispered in his ear; Zexion could feel the smile against his earlobe.

As he drifted off to sleep, he realized he had not had a drink in two nights.


	11. Day Ten

**A/N: **No wai! Stacked updates?

Sure thing! Bet you weren't expecting one so soon, huh? Well, I was lucky to be able to go ahead and get it turned out, but I wouldn't count on this on a regular basis, so…yeah. Enjoy it this time ^_^"

So here we have Day Ten, which is part one of two of what I've christened (in my head) the Demyx chapters. Ah, finally, we get into Dem's past….and his head! So, without further adieu….

(Remember, reviews make writers VERY happy)

Day Ten!

* * *

**~Streetrat (Nobody Loves You, Anyway)~**

* * *

The next morning, Zexion woke up early.

It was a surprise to him; he couldn't remember the last time he'd woken up without his alarm screaming in his ear, woken up naturally without the restless feel of insomnia and night terrors. He looked over to find that Demyx was still asleep.

He smiled, just slightly, to himself. Dem looked so peaceful, beautiful sleeping against the pillows. He was careful notwake him as he went to the window and stared out at the sun beginning to peek out over the horizon. The frozen surface of the lake refracted and scattered the soft orange and pink colors of the sunrise over clear-blue-white ice.

"I'm alive." He whispered after he'd watched for a while, and he touched his fingertips to the cool glass. "I'm _alive..."_

"I know."

The voice from behind startled him, but he turned to find that Demyx had woken, sat up, and was staring at him. He turned around, leaned back against the sill, and stared back. The smile that had begun earlier on his lips widened.

"It's about time you knew it too, Zex."

"Yeah, well…."

"Yeah, well? What-_ever_. Come sit with me."

He obliged willingly enough. He seated himself between Demyx's legs and leaned into his chest, and together they watched the sun wake the world up.

"I don't want to go." Zex complained softly when he caught the clock at eight o clock. "I'm comfortable."

"You'll be back in a few hours."

"For a while, but then I will have to go to work…"

"Zex."

"Yes?"

"I'm still gonna be here when you come back. That's a promise."

There was a beat in which both were silent, but soon Zexion nodded. "I would like you to promise me something else."

"What's that?"

"That when I return in a few hours, you will tell me about yourself. Your life, the one you spoke of with Axel."

"Zexion, I don't know…"

"I hardly think it's fair that my life should be an open book to you, but that yours is off limits."

"I just don't know if you really wanna know. I mean, what does it matter if I tell you? Of course I will. But it's not like it's….a pretty story."

"You'll tell me, though?"

"Yes."

"Very well, then. I will see you at our regular time."

**.x.**

Zexion returned from his other duties three or so hours later, as usual. The hospital was white and clinical, sterile, but Demyx seemed to fill the room with his presence and already he felt like he was at home there with him. The feeling was off putting; he wasn't used to being comfortable anywhere unless it was a bar or his room, and usually in both places there was a drink in his hand.

Then, however, he was stone cold sober, and had been for two days, which was strange in and of itself.

He didn't say a word to Demyx but sat in the bed with him.

"What do you want to know?" Demyx asked.

"Everything. From beginning to now."

"You're sure?"

"Yes."

Dem sighed and nodded. He began to play idly with Zexion's hair. "Like yours, my mother was a bit...different than others, but…..she wasn't violent, she wasn't angry. She was just….strange, I guess….."

_He remembered her little, but enough; she would sit on their front and rock on the swing, whispering the birds that flitted around her, backlit by the purple and grey of twilight.. When he thought of his mother, he thought of her like this first and above all._

_He couldn't say, then, whether she had loved him or not. He had never wanted for any provisions – there was always food to be had, clean clothes and a roof over his head. But his mother was quiet and distant, and he worried that the wrong words or moves would break her. She always seemed so...sad…._

_Looking back from a hospital bed, he knew that he hadn't understood, not really. He was just a little kid. She hadn't been a bad mother, he thought, she tucked him in and held him when he cried. But something wasn't right. The scope of his mind wasn't large or complicated enough to understand what was wrong with her, but he loved her regardless._

_Things went along in a quiet, easy manner that he had become accustomed to._

_And then, as things are wont to do, they changed._

_He was nine years old and kicked around a soccer ball in his room. The day didn't seem much different from the one before it and he didn't think the next day would be much different – it was summer and he played outside, sang sometimes quietly to himself, thought about the next year of school. He was going to be in fifth grade and he was quite proud, feeling rather grown up about it._

_He didn't notice that he wasn't alone until he saw the shadow fall across his path._

_Demyx turned to look. His mother always walked quietly, ghosting across their hardwood floors, and it was nearly impossible to hear her as she moved; she had made no sound to announce her presence, and stood in his doorway as if she'd simply been waiting for him to notice her. She was pale. Her eyes seemed sunken in to her frail frame._

_She knelt and opened her arms in a clear invitation, so he ran towards her and allowed her to hug him fiercely, found himself almost frightened by the ferocity of it. He wouldn't have imagined she could hold on so tightly._

_"I have to go away." She said quietly._

_"Where? Where are we going?"_

_"You're going anywhere. You can't go. You have to stay right here, sweetie, and very soon someone will come, and they will love you very much."_

_"But…Mommy…" He protested as she stood up. "I want you to stay. I want you to love me. Why – "_

_"Because I am like the ravens that sit on our porch at night. I wanted something that was not mine, and took it without the right to do so, and now, I – " She looked over her shoulder as she stopped in the doorway once more. "Goodbye, my darling."_

_As she left him there with his soccer ball, he had a vague feeling that it had something to do with his father, whom he'd never met. What she'd said about ravens, about going after what was never rightfully hers…he thought about it for a long time, but never found an answer. He was so young._

_For a week, he waited for 'someone' to come. He waited for the doorbell to ring or for someone to knock, and at night listened for the crunch of tires rolling into the driveway. Nothing happened. Nobody came. He was alone._

_On the second day after he ran out of food, when he felt like his stomach was eating itself, he ventured outside._

x.

_The streets were harsh and void, wet and hands were empty – nobody wanted to give – and the eyes of strangers accused him, mocked him, hated him when he crawled dirty and tugged on pants legs, when his own eyes were full of tears because goddamnit, it __**hurt **__to be so hungry._

_He slept behind metal trashcans and covered up with the old, tattered quilt he'd brought from his bed. He was ten now and sometimes wondered what it would be like to go back to his house, but he didn't think he could bear to see it so empty if he could even get there (he'd given lost a whole new meaning) and besides, he was sure someone else lived in it. Maybe the someone who was supposed to come for him._

_Then, one morning, he woke up to a pair of bright green eyes boring into his and a hand shaking his shoulder._

_"Hey, kid, you alive?"_

_"Wha – ?"_

_"Okay, good, didn't wanna find **another **__dead body, god." Green Eyes pulled back and Demyx could see his fair, feline face and mane of red hair. "What's your name, kid?"_

_"It – it's Demyx."_

_"Dem, then. How old are you?"_

_"T-ten. I th-think."_

_"You think? Okay, get on your feet. You're coming with me **before **__you turn into a dead body, got it memorized?"_

_Green Eyes, who Demyx guessed to be maybe sixteen or seventeen, helped him up; when Dem failed to walk very fast or very steadily, the older boy picked him up and carried him on his back. His stomach growled half-heartedly._

_"Will there be food where you're taking me?"_

_"Yeah. Totally. I'm not a skeleton, right? Wait, don't answer that. But I've always been this skinny, so no skin off Xiggy's back."_

_"Xiggy?"_

_"You'll meet him."_

_"Ah – oh – okay."_

_"I'm Axel, by the way."_

_"Axel."_

_"Yeah, got it memorized?"_

_"Uhhmmmm..."_

_"Don't worry about it."_

_After that, Demyx didn't pay much attention. He liked Axel, liked his warm and casual nature that was very close to comforting. He also got the idea that the redhead was very fond of the sound of his own voice., so he just closed his eyes and kind of half-dozed, failing completely to pay any sort of attention to whatever he was being told._

_Eventually he felt his feet hit the floor. Because he hadn't been paying attention and therefore hadn't been expecting it, he stumbled violently and tumbled right into a face full of fabric. It smelled not exactly clean, but not dirty – the scent was something like coffee, cigarette smoke, and something fresh like flowers._

_"You brought a kid?"_

_The chest behind the fabric vibrated with speech. The timbre of the voice was deep and rough, a perpetual growl, but Demyx didn't detect anger. He wanted to force himself away. Except that he was terrified and the face full of shirt seemed to be working for him at this particular moment._

_Eventually, hands (not as thin as Axel's, and rougher) grasped his shoulder and pushed him back gently, holding him at arm's length. He trembled, avoiding eye contact._

"_I'm not gonna hurt you." The growl said. "So you can relax."_

_Slowly, he forced himself to look up. The man before him was obviously a good deal older than Axel, perhaps by a decade or even two. He had a scar on his cheek and he was missing an eye, which he covered with an eye patch._

_Demyx thought he looked like a soldier who had probably won lots of medals for bravery. He couldn't decide if the idea comforted him or frightened him further. The man's one eye examined him carefully._

_"I'm Xigbar." He said. "What's your name?"_

"_Demyx."_

_"Good enough. You can stay here, Demyx, if ya want, and you can get something to eat."_

_"Food...please?"_

_"Saix will bring you something."_

_As Xigbar left the room. Demyx noticed that his steps were heavy and solid. He wondered – would he really be able to stay here? And eat?_

_He realized quickly that he was alone and used the opportunity to try to discern just where __**there **__was. It seemed like a very small apartment of detestable quality; within just a moment he spotted two cockroaches and too much peeling paint to count. But someone lived there. Xigbar, he supposed, and probably Axel and whoever this 'Saix' person happened to be_

_When a boy with blue tinted hair emerged from around the corner with a hot sandwich and a steaming bowl of soup, he thought that he would probably like it there very much._

**.x.**

"That's enough for now, yeah…" Demyx sighed, turning his eyes towards the clock. "You should probably head out for work anyway."

"That man, was he – the person that you talked about with Axel?"

"…..Xigbar, yeah." He said, stuttering a little over the name. "Powerful guy he was, for sure."

"But he doesn't come to see you."

"Nah, not a whole lot." Zexion frowned, but Demyx's face opened up into a wide smile. "Don't worry about it, though, Zex, because in the end he's why we met."

Zexion had no idea of how to respond, which was another clear first for him. He opened his mouth to say something, shut it, then opened it again and let his jaw just kind of hang for a moment. It was unfathomable to him the Demyx could be _alright _with his situation because he'd gotten to meet _him_. Zexion figured that as a human being he was fairly deplorable, and that Dem should have set his sights a little higher.

Demyx watched as the man he loved crawled out of bed and left for work. For a long time he stared at the door, but turned his head back to the lake eventually. He smiled a smile that was quite bittersweet – it was hard to tell his story, but he was so glad Zexion wanted to know that it made his heart swell almost to overflowing.

Zex, his broken bird.

He'd known almost immediately that he would love him. It had been the instinct he'd lived on for many years, crying in his veins for a different reason, calling him to the wonderful task of love. And because he believed in fate, he thought that perhaps this was the climax of his life. That this, that _Zexion_, was the reason he had lived to begin with. Knowing that his life had not been a complete waste was worth comfort. Watching Zex learn to love was worth a thousand times more.

It was strange how dying worked.

He found that he cared much less about things that used to matter. It was a perspective switch, as if the camera had swung around and suddenly changed angles. That _he_, Xigbar, couldn't be bothered enough – yeah, it stung still, stung deep inside somewhere underneath his heart – but it didn't crush him. It didn't destroy him. It mattered much less that he'd never been loved before when he knew that he would be dead in two weeks.

And even less than that when he realized he would die loving and loved. Die loved by a boy who had never known love before, an eloquent train wreck who managed perfection without knowing it.

He closed his eyes and thought about Zexion, how wonderful it had been to hear him feel alive….. how nice it would be to wake up with him again and again, every day until the end.

"It was worth it." He muttered, smiling, as he started to fall asleep. "Yeah. Everything was worth it."


	12. Day Eleven

**A/N: **So here it is, another Demyx-centric chapter of Trains and Sewing Machines I hope that you guys enjoy it. I finally got my own laptop, so I was able to sit down today and just hammer this thing out. Not that not having my own computer has ever stopped me before, but now I didn't have the excuse of being lazy XD. Anyyyyyway, I'll let y'all get to it.

Review? Please? For me? I will love you. Promise.

* * *

~**The Truth (Now Here's a Dose of Reality)~**

* * *

_"Yo, Demyx." Axel lowered himself into a moth eaten armchair they'd found on the side of the road one day. Demyx was in a beanbag chair (much loved for their ability to be easily transported) across the small living room, strumming his old guitar lazily, and he looked up at his friend. Axel's nose and lip were bleeding; this did not seem to faze him at all, and it took Dem all of three seconds to deduce what had happened._

"_Saix again?"_

_"Sure as shit." Axel said. He lit a cigarette. Demyx wondered why he hadn't left yet – he was nineteen now, and therefore had more options, yet he had chosen to stay with them – but he had never found the courage to ask him. He was just grateful that he was still there. While he liked the other boys (they were, for all intents and purposes, his brothers), he liked Axel the best._

_Saix was tough and cold. He and Axel had a love-hate relationship that was hard to understand, but Demyx kind of figured that their personalities just clashed, or maybe it had to do with something that happened before Axel had found him four years ago. But he figured that for all the bravado there was something underneath the boy, seventeen now, that was unexpected…he had seen Saix standing outside wherever they happened to be living, basking in the moonlight and almost-smiling._

_Luxord he liked. Luxord was witty and charming, but he always beat you at cards – Dem hadn't won, not once, and as far as he knew nobody else had, either. While Saix was hiding something, Luxord hid nothing. What you saw was what you got._

_But the master of hiding, Demyx thought, was Riku._

_Riku had shown up about a year after Dem, with no explanation. He had been twelve, then, and spoke little; even as he began to talk more, he offered nothing of himself or his past. The Riku Dem knew this day, the Riku who made them laugh with his quick wit and sent enemies cowering to their corner with his even quicker fists – even that Riku was still a mystery. While he wanted to know, he let it be for the feeling that the past was more painful than any of theirs…._

_And then there was Xigbar. He was their mentor, their father, their savior, their everything. He was who had taught them the ways of the streets and how to squat, steal, fight. Survive. It was back to the jungle, but this jungle was of steel and glass; and if you didn't fight you'd die, if you didn't steal you'd starve. Kill or be killed, the new millennium upped the ante. After seeing what he'd seen in the four years since he'd been out there, Demyx knew he would have died._

_There were some times, at night when they were curled up on their mattresses, that his mentor would slide a hand up the back of his shirt and count his vertebrae with his fingers. Sometimes he would nuzzle the skin between Demyx's ear and skull and whisper things, barely comprehensible, and Dem would smell the alcohol in waves. The scent didn't reek anymore, not to any of them. But Demyx didn't know if he was the only one._

_"You okay there, Dems?"_

_"Huh? Oh, yeah. Just thinking."_

"_Don't hurt yourself." _

"_Nah, I'm alright." He waved it off. "What did you guys fight over this time?"_ _the right thing to say, but there was nothing more he could do about it. _

_"Something stupid, I'm sure. I don't even remember."_

_"Did you win?"_

_"Fuck yes, I won. You should see him. He's crawling around here like a kicked puppy."_

_"-Who's a kicked puppy?" Saix's voice, harsh and growling, interrupted. Demyx stifled a laugh. Poor bastard really did look like he'd had his ass handed to him, bloody and bruised, and standing there looking all roguishly offended._

_"That would be you, Sai, darling."_

_"Hey, Axel. Shut the fuck up. You got lucky this time, is all." "_

_"And the last three times, I'm sure."_

_"You fucking – "_

_Demyx couldn't help it. He burst out laughing. Saix looked so ridiculous like that, and he was sure Axel would whip him again, and didn't they ever learn and okay, maybe he'd had something to drink, maybe a little too much whiskey but hell it was good and those two were so damn _funny.

_Saix rounded on him with an expression akin to that of a rabid dog._

_"What the hell are you laughing at?" He barked._

_"– You." He choked out through his laughter. When Saix lifted him by the collar and slammed him into a wall, it occurred to him that this was perhaps_ not_ the right thing to say, but there was nothing more he could do about it. _

"_I'm the funny one? Me, you little shit? You little _pet! _Do you enjoy being Xigbar's favorite, huh? Reaping the rewards of the all the shit we do, all the men we've fucked, just because you're fucking _him!_ You think we don't see the way he cuddles up to you at night? The way he touches you? We're not blind. You're such a fucking slut!" Demyx's head hit the wall hard as Saix shook him, and spots danced in his vision._

_Axel rushed to them and slammed his fist into the side of Sai's head. Saix retaliated by kicking Demyx hard in the stomach. Riku, who had just come in the door, jumped into the fray._

_"Leave him alone, you bastard!" Riku screamed. "He's just a kid! For fuck's sake, he's thirteen, asshole!"_

_Dem, sputtering, pulled himself off of the floor and staggered away. His head was spinning, his ears were ringing, and he still couldn't stop laughing. He managed to make it into Xigbar's room._

_"Whoa, kid!" Xiggy cried. "What the hell happened to you?"_

_Demyx didn't answer, but he crawled over to Xigbar and laid his head in his lap. Rough, weathered hands stroked his hair._

_"The boys are fighting again."_

_"They're fuckin' idiots, for sure. They've gotta work tonight."_

_He sighed. Axel, Saix and Riku all sold their bodies for money; Demyx was deemed too young to do so yet, but next year he would be old enough. They were squatters. With no rent and no bills, Dem often wondered where the money went, but he supposed it was all used on alcohol and drugs._

_He wasn't paying attention, and so when Xigbar's lips met his, he was completely surprised. He didn't know how to respond, didn't know what to do, and so he kissed back. He gave in. He said nothing as he was laid on the mattress and stripped of his clothing, and he was soon a slave to desire, knew he'd wanted this and the hot feeling brutally claiming his body._

_He was being accused of this anyway, wasn't he? Wasn't that what they all thought? He might as well give in to it, might as well surrender. And the lust in his small adolescent body demanded that he do just that, so he tilted his hips up and waited for whatever might come._

_He cried out in pain as something stiff and wet forced its way into his tight entrance. It _hurt_.__ Oh fuck, did it hurt. He tried not to scream as Xigbar's erection thrust in and out of him. But after some time the pain turned into an aching soreness and pleasure returned, swept through him, made his bruised stomach clench with ecstasy. He climaxed quickly with a short cry. Xigbar came three minutes later and collapsed onto the mattress._

_"Not bad for your first time, kid."_

_"Th-thanks, I guess…"_

"_It's okay, you'll get better."_

_That sentence struck Demyx as absolutely hilarious, and he began to laugh again, to laugh so hard he couldn't breathe. "F-fucking unbelievable." He choked out. "Oh, f-fuck."_

_"Are you okay?"_

_"I think….I th-think I'm gonna be sick."_

_He was led into the bathroom, where he was violently ill, and laughed and cried at the same time while he expelled the contents of his stomach. When he was done, they went into the bedroom, and Xigbar read him Catcher in the Rye as he fell asleep._

**.x.  
**  
"I…"

"You don't have to say anything, Zex…"

"I just, I don't know what to say." He sighed. Losing his words, being unable to speak – these things had never happened to him before he met Demyx, but he was beginning to get used to being at a loss around the patient. He closed his eyes and listened to Dem's heartbeat thumping through his skin and the thin layer of hospital gown. "Except maybe that I am sorry."

"There's nothing to be sorry for. We talked about this yesterday, remember? I had the chance to meet you. To be with you for the time I've got left, okay, so stop apologizing, stop stressing it…"

"I can't wrap my head around the fact that you're alright with dying because of _me._"

"That's because you have no clue how precious you are."

Zexion scoffed. His stomach flipped. "I'm not precious, I'm a bastard."

"Zex – "

"No. You need to know. I'm a bastard. I manipulate people, I lie to them, I say whatever people need to hear so I can get what I want from them."

"I know you did. But it's different now."

"How do you know? How do you know I'm not lying to you? How do you – "

"Shut up." He said softly. "I know. I know you're being honest with me and I know you love me, just like I know I love you. So please, stop, and just…just let yourself feel."

Zexion was quiet. He did what he was asked, because he _wasn't _lying, because he _did_ love Demyx. Inexplicably, and taken completely by surprise, he loved him. He let himself feel that warm surge, the settling in his heart of old wounds that suddenly didn't seem to matter half as much as they had just two weeks ago.

"Do you want me to finish telling you? I did promise I'd tell you everything…."

"Yes." He whispered. "Please."

**.x.  
**  
_The sun was rising over the city of Chicago, and Demyx, the first one awake, crawled out of bed; Xigbar propped himself up on his elbow, wakened by the motion_

_The first thing Demyx registered in the weak morning light was that he hurt._

_His muscles ached so badly that he couldn't even make it to the dresser to put on clothing. His skin felt hot, flushed; a ball of nausea curled in his stomach._

_"Are you okay?" Xigbar asked as he sat down._

_"I think I'm sick."_

_"Your eyes look weird." He got out of bed and pulled Demyx back to it. "Lay down."_

_"Right, okay, my stomach – "_

_He watched as the man he'd been sleeping with for a year rushed into the kitchen to get a bowl, which he set down by the bed. Demyx leaned over it and promptly threw up._

_He laid in bed the entire day. He couldn't keep any food down; only water and that was if he was lucky. He tried to convince himself that he would feel better the next day. But he didn't. Nor did he the day after that, or the day after that. Axel would often come in and sit by his bed, stroke his hair. Riku would come tell him stories and keep him updated on the scout for a new place, make him laugh. Luxord played cards with him and even let him win once._

_Xigbar read to him like he always had._

_Finally, one day, Xigbar dragged him out of bed and hailed a taxi to take them to Castle Memorial. Demyx wondered how they were ever going to afford it, but he said nothing, just praying for relief._

_At the hospital they ran tests and gave him something which soothed his stomach and eased the ache in his muscles. Beyond this, Dem didn't think anything else of it, despite the fact that they'd never received an official diagnosis. When they asked for a number, Xigbar gave them the one of the payphone at the corner near their place._

_Demyx started to worry when waiting by the phone became something that they drew shifts for, except he was never allowed to stand and wait for its ring._

_More than anything else, more than the fights between Axel and Saix, more than Luxord's games, he remembered the follow-up appointment at the hospital. No longer plagued with pain that blocked out everything else, he took in his surroundings like he'd been taught to do – the white walls, bright lights, sterile smell. He swung his legs against the cold metal table he sat on, and listened as the doctor explained to them about AIDS._

_The knowledge that he was going to die filled every pore of his body, and when they returned home, he shut himself in their room and screamed at the top of his lungs._

_Ever since he was nine years old, his life had been focused on surviving. Eating and drinking, having a roof over their heads, knocking your opponents out before they could dream of doing it to you. That night he had to watch the faces of his brothers as they learned that they would lose one of their numbers. He saw Axel and Saix hug and thought that maybe it was worth something, but he knew that soon he wouldn't be able to see them again. He wouldn't see anything at all. He wondered if they would miss him…if they would miss his singing, his constant loss at card games, his laugh. He wondered if he'd made any difference at all by existing, or if he would fade away, forgotten._

_After that he wouldn't allow Xigbar to fuck him, because whether he'd given him the disease or if it had come from whoring him out so he could drink and get high, it was his fault. He slept on Axel's bed then, Axel who understood and didn't criticize him when cried himself to sleep._

_When he grew too sick to stay with the group, when he lagged behind and collapsed and coughed up blood, Xigbar put him in the hospital and left him there. He paid for everything, but he never visited. He didn't seem to care enough._

_None of the other boys came to see him, either. He wondered if they didn't care, or if they'd been told he was dead._

_He was all alone._

_There by himself, he began to make friends with the nurses. He had a lot of time to think, and he dealt with the anger and pain. He made peace with himself and with God, with the mother he lost and the man who had abandoned. When the doctors informed him that he had maybe three weeks to live, he was serene and ready to die._

.**.x.**

"And then you walked right into my life." Demyx said quietly, wiping a rogue tear from Zexion's face. "And I'm still ready to die, I'm okay with it, but I don't want to leave you behind."

"I'm not going to make it without you."

"You're lying." He smiled. "Cause I know you, and I know you're strong enough to do this. If I am, you are, got it?"

"No."

Demyx chuckled. "You're cute, but you'll learn, you'll see, you're going to be okay."

"But – "

"Do you trust me?"

"…..yes."

"Kay then." Lightly, he kissed Zexion's forehead. "You're gonna be just fine."


	13. Day Twelve

**A/N: **Sorry for the delay, everyone! College just started and these past two weeks were absolutely insane. Regardless, here's Day Twelve of TaSM - I hope you enjoy :) And remember, of course, to review.

* * *

**Day Twelve: The Ocean (Take Me Somewhere Else)**

* * *

Sunday dawned with little grandeur, a soft mix of pink and orange shining through the window.

Zexion was awake and dressing already; Demyx was still asleep. After changing into his white uniform Zexion allowed himself to press a chaste kiss to his patient's lips, something Dem would never allow for fear of infecting him, however irrational that fear might be. And for a moment Zex thought of forcing it upon himself so that he may crucify himself with it. Suffer and die for love that should have never existed.

But he didn't have the courage.

He slid out of the room quietly and went to perform his duties. Here, at least, was a time where he could think – and as he handed out mail, he thought of the first time he had met Demyx. Bringing him mail. After hearing Demyx's story, he was certain he knew exactly who that letter had been from, and it made him shudder internally. It had been, he was sure, from _him_, Xigbar, who had done the man he loved so much wrong.

But if it hadn't been for that wrong, he'd never have met him.

In a way he saw from Dem's perspective. But more than that he wished he had continued to suffer, so that Demyx might have lived, prospered, been happy. He would have suffered a thousand times for Demyx's happiness.

It was too late to change anything now. The thought sunk into him like a lead weight and he wished, badly, for trains and sewing machines to thread him back together. To escape and hope that time would heal. But he had no hope for that. And he had no choice. Demyx was here and so would he be, clinging on until there was nothing left.

He didn't think he would be able to leave this place afterwards, either. Not where the memory still lived – maybe he could hold on to that, memory.

It was late morning when he finished his tasks. He shed his uniform and dropped it off, then trudged through the ice to the apartment he and Larxene had shared not too long ago. He wanted to visit her because….

Well, because she was his _friend. _His best friend, at that. And he'd actually found himself missing her.

He fished his old key from his pocket and turned the lock, pushed the door open. Larxene was sitting at the table having a glass of orange juice. She looked towards the door when he opened it, then quickly leapt from her chair and ran to hug him.

It felt almost like they hadn't seen each other in years, despite that it had only been a few days.

She didn't let him go for a long time, and he was alright with it, hugging her back. "How are you?" He asked her. For the first time he discovered that he actually cared.

"I'm okay, I'm good. How are you?"

"Still a bastard."

"Well, it's not like you could change that." She teased. She pulled back to look at him – he felt suddenly as if he was being appraised. "But seriously, you look different. What happened?"

"Larxene, I'm in love."

"You're what now?"

"In love."

"What? With who?" She stepped back, looking genuinely surprised. "Why haven't I heard about her? Who is it that – "

"It's a guy."

"What? Oh, him then. But – "

"He's one of the patients I work with."

He watched as the realization hit her.

"That….that AIDS patient….?"

"Yeah." He sighed. "That's the one. His name is Demyx."

"I….see." She sat down on the couch. He sat next to her. "Are you ready to deal with what's going to happen?"

"No."

For a long time they sat in silence because they had nothing to say, but the silence was comfortable. Larxene leaned against him and he stroked her hair – they watched the television absently, but he wasn't paying very much attention to whatever was showing.

"Tomorrow is Christmas Eve." She said after some time.

"I know." He reached into his pocket. "I got you something. I probably won't be around tomorrow evening, or the night after that, so – I suppose you could say this is my Christmas visit. I bought you something." She watched expectantly as he fished around in his pocket for her gift. It was small enough to fit in his closed fist, so that was how he offered it.

She uncurled his fingers to reveal a small silver circle with a rose pattern engraved into the front, attached to a thin chain.

"What is it?"

"Open it."

She took it from his palm and searched for the edges, then gently opened it. Inside was a picture she had taken of Zexion about a year prior, catching him unawares; he was leaning against the wall outside their school, sneaking a cigarette. He seemed to be looking at something outside the camera's field of vision, off to the side.

"Zexion…..you're scaring me." She said.

"Why?"

"Because….you just don't _do _things like this. You don't even like Christmas, or gifts, and you definitely don't do _sentimental _things. This….this makes me feel like you think….."

"Think what?"

"Well, that you won't be around much longer."

There was another silence, this one deep and deafening, and it seemed to encase his heart. "I don't know." He whispered. "But whatever I do, whatever it is, please don't try to – "

"You asshole!" She leapt up, her face twisted in anger. "You – promised – you would come back! Remember? You promised me you would come back, you can't - !"

"Larxene."

His voice, calm and steady, seemed to stop her. The anger disappeared and then, to his positive horror, she began to cry. He had only seen her cry once before, when her father died of a heart attack in the tenth grade. He had spent days at her house then and held her while she soaked his clothes, played chess with her to keep her mind off it.

Afterwards they had both pretended like nothing had happened, although they had clearly reached a new level in their friendship.

"I don't know what to tell you." He said. "I'm in love, and I don't know what will happen when it's gone. I don't have any plans, but I don't know what's coming."

"It's never going to disappear." She cried. "It's not going to go anywhere! Just because he's dying, once he's dead, you can still love him – I read, once, in a book, that 'life has to end, but love doesn't.' That's true, you know? If Marly died, I would still –"

"Wait, you're in love with him?"

"Well, I don't know, it's – it's another story, okay? Can we focus on this? You're not allowed to die. Just flat-out not _allowed_.Okay? Okay." She sniffled. He hugged her, and they stayed like that for a while, best friends uncertain of what the future would hold.

**.x.**

"Axel, can I ask you somethin'?"

"Sure, shoot."

"Why didn't you ever come to visit me?" Demyx asked.

"Because….well, I didn't know. I didn't know where you were."

"But…..but _he_ told you. I was there."

Axel looked at him like he was insane. "He told us that you had decided to leave us." He said. "That soon you would be able to find a new place, a new family. He never told us that you were sick, he – don't you remember? I mean, we all suspected when you got pale, when you slowed down, you – Dem – I never abandoned you." His tone was pleading. "You were my best friend. I never abandoned you."

"Remember…" He thought back and tried to recall the memory. He remembered, then, that he had been quiet; that the world had seemed a blur; that he had seen Xigbar's lips moving, but had not heard his words. "Oh, no….I thought….I assumed…."

"You know what they say about assumption…"

"I'm sorry…"

"Really, do you put it past him? He whored us all out. I'm still in the business, only I'm my own pimp."

"You still…?"

"It's money, man. After you left our little family kind of fell apart. What else was I gonna do?"

There was silence. They didn't speak again until Axel left, and the exchange was brief.

Demyx stared out the window. Throughout the time he'd been at the hospital, he'd never considered that perhaps hisband of brothers had no idea what had happened to him, because he was sure that Xigbar had told him. But what Axel had said put a new perspective on the situation, and he wasn't entirely sure what to think. What to feel. He wondered if this was what Zexion went through on a daily basis.

But most of all, he felt relief, because he hadn''t been abandoned after all.

**.x. **

When Zexion left Larxene's apartment, he was surprised – and pleased – to find that the snow had ceased its assault on the city of Chicago. As he was walking back to the hospital, and idea struck him, and he quickened his pace.

At the hospital, he requested permission to take Demyx out of the hospital for three hours. Though the typical procedure was to request in advance, he was able to – after about twenty minutes – use his way with words to convince them to grant his request.

He smiled to himself as he took the elevator up to Dem's room. He still had it. Perhaps, he thought somewhat whimsically, he should become a writer; he then found himself surprised that he had had a thought that could even be considered somewhat whimsical. .He just didn't _do_ whimsy. It wasn't his thing. He did words and cold, clinical observations and lies and pain.

But love was a powerful force.

"Come on." He said, sticking his head into room 669. "Put on some clothes – we're leaving."

"What?"

"Don't ask questions." He said, and shut the door. He had a wheelchair, and when Demyx came shakily stepping out the door moments later, he helped him into it. He said nothing. He continued to say nothing as he pushed Demyx down the hallway, down the elevator, and out into the cold air.

He took off his jacket, ignoring the chill, and draped it over Demyx's torso in addition to the jacket Dem already had on. He added three heavy blankets supplied by the hospital.

"Zex - "

"Not risking anything. The cold weather slows down your body's white cell production, weakening your immune system. Yours is already weak."

"…..oh. Uhm, thanks."

"Yeah."

Zexion wheeled him around the hospital building until they were positioned directly on the lakeshore. He heard Demyx breathe in and out deeply. "I've only really looked at this from the hospital room." He said.

"I know." Zexion responded. "You're interested in the lake….in the ducks, if I remember."

"It's not just that, I…..I pretend…that it's the ocean."

"Why? Why do you watch the water so much?"

"Because I want to be somewhere else. The ocean will take me somewhere else. It will carry my weight, sing me to sleep. I imagine that...after, it will...just be the ocean. Taking me somewhere else."  
"You have such hope."

"When you're dying, hope is all that's left."

**.x.**

The words Demyx had spoken by the lake struck Zexion somewhere deep inside, somewhere like his heart. He considered, once again, the value of touch; and thought that touch did not have to be physical to matter. It was a difficult concept. His heart had never been touched before.

_When you're dying, hope is all that's left._It was true. True for Demyx who would soon pass into the void of death, and true for Zexion who had been dying for a long time before they had encountered each other. The deaths were different, but it didn't matter. They were equally as painful.

He crawled into bed and watched the blonde fall asleep. He wondered what he was dreaming of.

That Demyx had lived the life he had and still becoming such a remarkable man was beyond him. His own father, who had suffered his mother but little else, had become a pathetic and fundamentally broken human being. The hell he lived was a chosen one, for he chose to stay with his mother, and even so he could do nothing but drink and fight. Demyx, however, had not chosen the hand he was dealt – yet he faced not only pain but death itself with a peaceful smile.

Zexion didn't know what to think of himself in light of both extremes.

He had suffered a life he had not chosen, but he had exacerbated his own suffering by wrapping himself in the cool embrace of apathy. No feelings – no love, no pain, no remorse. A cold existence, but a safe one, empty but secure.

The emptiness had been filled and he wouldn't go back. But what, he question, did all of that make him? Did it make him weak? Or was it simply natural, a conditioned response to avoid pain?

"Zex…" Demyx murmured. Zexion startled, thinking he was asleep.

"Yes?"

"You should sleep…it's okay….I won't let them hurt you…." He smiled slightly, sleepily, forcing a smile onto Zex's face as well. "Come on…"

"Fine." Zexion sighed. He laid his head on Dem's chest and closed his eyes. It was a comfortable place, safer than apathy and sometimes just as dangerous, for he knew it would soon be gone.

He drifted to sleep almost instantly.


	14. Day Thirteen

**A/N: ** Whoot! Another update! Thank the long weekend for this one J Hope everyone enjoys.

_

**~ Amends (Savior) ~**

It was warm inside the church.

Outside it was snowing. _Really_ snowing. Not sleeting, not a descending formless mass of cold, ugly white. Snowing. Perfect and individual snowflakes drifting from the sky, falling down to the Earth in a display of quiet beauty.

Zexion took a seat in an empty back pew and slowly pulled off his gloves. A choir was singing a Christmas carol, and the preacher was standing at the podium, looking over their Christmas Eve sermon.

The attendants were of all ages and races, but he felt extremely out of place. He fidgeted. He didn't _belong_ here, why was he here? He hated God – why was he here? God didn't exist – why the fuck, he asked himself in an almost panicked tone, was he _there_?

He wished he could disappear inside of his heavy black jacket. He couldn't remember the last time he had felt like that, so invisible, wishing he could hide away.

The preacher spoke of Christ, of their Savior. Zexion had heard the story before hundreds of times coming up in the Catholic Church, but this place was not Catholic and he listened, quiet, though unable to sit entirely still. He felt as though he were waiting for something.

But nothing happened. No voice spoke from heaven, no epiphany revealed itself to him. The world made less sense than it had before he walked in. He had a hard time believing in any kind of savior.

He didn't deserve salvation. Demyx did, yet none had come.

The service ended. People streamed out of the church, but Zexion stayed there for a moment, staring at the stained glass windows and the image of the cross. If only, he thought, he could have found his heart inside this building instead of inside a dying man.

"Merry Christmas, young man." The pastor said after he had been there for a while. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

"No. You can't help me."

"Touché. I'm just a mortal, after all." The man smiled kindly as he sat next to him. "But maybe God can?"

"I don't believe in God."

"Why not?"

"Do you have all night?" Zexion said sardonically. "If God existed the man I am in love with would not be dying for something he had no control over. If God existed, he would have struck me dead. My mother would have never – ugh. Let's just, I don't talk about my mother."

"Fair enough." The pastor said. Zex found himself surprised. By the standards of this faith there were so many things wrong with the sentence he just spoke, he expected to be thrown into the street. "But God is not responsible for the sins of man. In fact, he sent Christ to save us from those sins."

Zexion stood up. "I'm sorry. I can't do this. I'm not going to become friends with you and we're not going to slowly become friends. You're not going to be someone I come to trust and depend on and eventually accept the 'savior' into my life. If there was a savior – ha." He shook his head. "Merry Christmas. Thanks anyway."

**.x.**

While Zexion was sitting in a church searching for some kind of answer, Axel was sitting on Skid Row with his guitar on his lap and a joint between his lips. It was a bad night for the drunks, he noted; every Christmas, he was bound to see many of them swaying down the streets wailing carols at the top of their lungs.

His cellphone vibrated once in his pocket. He pulled it out and checked, figuring, hey, Saix probably wanted to meet for a drink and it was Christmas so maybe he _wouldn't _come out of this with a bloody nose.

Instead, he saw Roxas' name.

_Want 2 come 2 my place 4 dinner?_

Axel bit his lip and forced himself to wait three whole, tortuous seconds before firing back a quick 'yes'. He knew where Roxas lived – having gone out for casual dinners a few times in the past, he'd often dropped him off at his apartment. But he'd made, like _no_ headway….until now.

He jumped up and stuffed his guitar into its case, slung it over his shoulder, and snuffed out the joint, pocketing it for later. He hurried back to his apartment, jumped into his car, and drove right to Roxas' place.

"How do you feel about Chinese?" Roxas asked when he arrived.

"I love Chinese. They're really great in bed."

Roxas shot him a glare. Axel sniggered. Immature, maybe, but he couldn't help it, and besides. Rox should be kind of used to his humor by now. He plopped down on the couch as the blonde ordered their food from the local Chinese place.

"Yeah, I just kind of wanted to chill." He explained, sitting down next to Axel. "But it kind of sucks being alone on Christmas, so I thought….."

"That I'd be alone too? Gee, I'm glad you have so much – "

"Oh god, I didn't mean it like that, I just – I mean – "

"Relax, Roxy. I was by myself. Your invitation was perfectly welcome."

"Yeah. Uh, sorry it's not very Christmas-y in here…"

"I've got you covered."

"What?"

Axel reached into his pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. "Marlboro Reds…" He said, digging around for the joint. "And some green. We're covered. Now if only you had some mistletoe…."

Roxas laughed and rolled his eyes at the same time, unable to help himself. The doorbell rang, signaling the arrival of their eggrolls and fried rice. They dug in. And for a long time just talked about whatever they happened to think about – they drank beer and sang Christmas carols and threw rice at each other, much to Roxas' later dismay because it would 'be hell to get this out of my carpet.'

"Hey, Rox, take a deep breath. It's just carpet. And besides, it's your fault, _you_ started the Great Rice Fight of 2009."

"Yeah, well, you totally had it coming, making it _your_ fault."

"Hey well – shut the fuck up, okay?"

Roxas nearly choked on his last bite of eggroll from laughter, and shoved Axel lightly. "Let's look at our fortune cookies." He said after he had safely swallowed the egg roll.

"Yeah, okay, cool." They unwrapped them, broke them open, and read. "That's funny."

"What is?" Roxas asked.

"Mine says, 'You will make sweet, sweet love to a cute blonde kid in his living room."

"Hm. I heard there's a cute blonde kid a few doors down."

"You want to show me where he lives?"

"Yeah, just a second." He laughed and held his up, as if holding it up to the light. He then crumpled it up in the palm of his hand, ducked off the couch, and crawled under his glass coffee table. Axel, bewildered, followed him, though his height made him somewhat uncomfortable, legs sprawled out at strange angles. "You want to know what mine said?" Roxas whispered.

"What."

"Fuck mistletoe." He tapped the glass where the joint Axel had brought was lying on top of the table "It's close enough."

They kissed.

**.x.**__

It's Christmas, Demyx. Merry Christmas. I never liked the holiday, but you wanted to celebrate it, so here we are. I probably don't seem like the letter-writing type to you. I'm not. I don't do love notes or public displays of affection, although I suppose you could say before now I never participated in public displays of anything. In any case I'm writing this to you because you're different and I want you to be able to have something of me even when I'm not around. Perhaps it's odd to you given the situation, that I would want you to be **reminded** of me even though I will never have the chance to leave you for a long period of time. I know you can't read very well, either. So I suppose I just called myself out on my own bullshit.

I love you.

That's why. Over and over and over again I love you – that's why I'm writing this. There's the proof, yours and mine. I'm not lying. I am not manipulating or twisting or doing the things that I normally do to get along with life, because I **do **love you, and the more I realize that the more I realize that life and I were never destined to get along. Nothing will ever be easy again. I will never live in the apathy I adapted for myself, for protection, because I no longer want to be protected. Do you understand? I feel like a frog who has been dissected and examined, torn apart from the inside.

Before you my existence was neat. It was easily compartmentalized, and feelings were put in a special place that I thought I didn't have to touch. Except when I did. When the lights went out or I had nightmares, when I was haunted by them. I thought I could spend my life running from emotion and memory, and that when it was time to die, I would take death as something welcome.

Not that everything has changed. But if you were to live, then also would I long for life; only it doesn't seem as if there is any way that could be true. Before I met you my reason for wanting death was only that I hated life. And I will hate life again once you are not in it. It's worth nothing without you.

But if you wish for me to live, and I think that you do, I will try.

I will admit openly to you now that I will probably fail. You have stripped me of the only thing that I have ever been good at, which of course is lying and exploiting others to meet my own end. I imagine – what if I had met you without this? I would have manipulated you as well. The thought of this makes me sick. Why is it that my only option for successfully meeting you, in a way that would benefit my life, is under these circumstances?

God is cruel.

My parents tried to hammer me with religion. My mother, especially, tried to drill God into me. Her attempt did nothing but reassure me that God could not exist, and once I burned a Bible in our backyard. I loved it, watching it go up in flames. I think I realize now that I was rebelling against her. Not God, but my mother.

Now I feel as though I should rebel against him. When I look at the world around us, the death and sickness, the pestilence in our streets, I wonder how God could let this happen. When I look at you and think of how beautiful you are now, and how that beauty must have been multiplied tenfold before you became sick. I wonder how a God who loves us could let something so horrific happen to the innocent you were.

I was never an innocent. Though I hold anger and bitterness toward my mother and father for what they put me through, I don't see it as corruption. I was never whole to begin with. There is something wrong with me, and I feel that maybe I was born with this defect. That perhaps that is why they never loved me, that they were incapable of loving something as wrong as I am. So I can scarcely blame God for my own situation. I cannot blame him for what I did to myself, but only what he did to you.

But I am troubled, troubled so much that I just may have to believe. If Heaven does not exist, then where will you go? You are too bright and beautiful even in the face of death to simply fade from being. Your light is too bright to just **fade**.

If I were the God I once believed myself to be, I would create a Heaven just for you.

I love you, Demyx. I am grateful that I was given a chance to meet you. You saved my life in every way possible; you are the hope that is left to my dying soul.

Thank you for everything you have given me, the extent of which you'll never know.

Love,

Zexion

**.x.**

His vision was blurred, and he felt as if he could barely speak as he finished reading aloud the words he had penned to Demyx on the inside cover of _Catcher in the Rye_. He looked up to see that the blonde, too, was crying openly; he felt that there was no shame between them anymore.

He closed the book and held it out to Demyx. It was by no means brand new – in fact, it was the first copy he'd ever owned.

Dem sniffled and took the book. He hugged it to his chest. "Zex…..come here…."

Zexion obliged him without urging. He climbed into that small, cramped hospital bed like it was home. "Merry…Christmas." He muttered.

"Merry Christmas. I've got a gift for you, too, y'know….."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. Close your eyes."

He closed his eyes and waited. Soon, Demyx's lips descended on his, soft and chapped in places, and in every way perfect. It was the most wonderful kiss in the world. Zexion could feel it, their love, golden and warm, and he wanted more, wanted to hold it forever.

Demyx started to pull away. Zex placed a hand on the back of his neck and didn't let him.

"Please." He whispered against his lips. "I need this."

"Zex….you know…."

"I don't care."

"I care." Demyx pulled back just the barest amount, and this time Zexion let him. "I'm not gonna risk you dying with me, I won't play a part in that, okay…" He stroked the side of Zex's face lightly. "I want you to live. You just promised me you'd try. You can break it, Zex, you can break your own cycle, keep your promise…"

The tears started to flow freely from Zexion's eyes once more. He nodded.

With snowflakes falling outside on the most beautiful Christmas Eve of his life, the only one worth living through, Zexion fell asleep in the arms of the man that he loved.


	15. Day Fourteen

So the first thing to do is apologize for the incredibly long wait and for the short length of this chapter. To be honest, me and Day 14 just weren't getting along with each other at all - writer's block plus college is a really terrible combination. BUT I'm on summer break right now and I think, for the most part, I've gotten past my block. :) I'm going to try to be a lot better about updating this, because it's a story I really really enjoy writing.  
I hope you like reading it as much as I like writing it, and I hope you enjoy this chapter...and I hope you review! ^_^

* * *

**~Drinking Again (Another Hole in the Wall)~**

* * *

_"Hide and seek  
Trains and sewing machines  
(you won't catch me around here)  
blood and tears  
they were here first..." _

* * *

He woke before Demyx, just as the sun was lighting up the night sky with pink and red. A new day dawning; Christmas day, and Zexion marveled that he felt no revulsion towards it as he had for many years. He looked at Dem sleeping peacefully, wondered what he was dreaming of. He noticed that the blonde was clutching his letter as if it were a lifeline.

For so long he had believed that love, if it existed, was certainly not for him. That it was cruel and brutal, and that he was incapable of being loved to begin with.  
But there, lying in a hospital bed, was the proof that this was not the case. The living, breathing, dying proof.

Once Demyx was gone he figured he would have nothing but memory, nothing but himself – and he trusted himself least of all. The thought made him feel sick and thirsty for a drink, something to take the edge off of his pain and panic. He was restless and shaky. The four walls of the hospital room suddenly seemed stifling.

"I have to go for a little bit." He whispered in Demyx's ear. "But I'll be back."

Trembling, he pulled himself from the bed and made his way to the lobby, then out onto the streets. An icy wind whipped off of the lake and slammed into him with it's chill fury. He shivered, but did not feel refreshed at all.

He knew that there wouldn't be any bars open yet, so he shoved his hands in the pocket of his jeans and began to wander. He thought of his mother, of Larxene, of Axel...but above all he thought of the patient still sleeping inside the hospital. He was ashamed of himself - and shame, he discovered, was a crippling, suffocating feeling. It seemed to him that he might fall and be crushed beneath the weight of it.

Somewhere to the east he heard the train. _If only, _he thought to himself. _If only it were that easy. _

But it wasn't easy, a fact which he was acutely and painfully aware of. It was, in fact, the hardest thing he'd ever done, this _love _thing. He didn't think he would do it differently if he was given the option, knew he wouldn't trade Dem for anything in the world, but that didn't change the aching in his heart. It didn't kill the pain.

After he had wandered for some time, he came across a bar whose open sign flickered feebly in the morning light. It was nothing special, just another hole in the wall, a small dive to which he had never been before. He was glad for that; he didn't wanto to see anyone he might know, didn't want to explain himself, didn't want to to admit that for all his charm and bravado he was too weak to spend Christmas morning with the person that he loved.

Inside the bar it was smoky and dim. Faded posters hung on the wall, and the paint was peeling, but someone had half-heartedly hung garland and plastic snowflakes in an attempt to decorate for the holidays. A depressed looking Christmas tree stood in the corner.

There was one other client who looked as though he very well might be a permanent fixture there. He was quiet and seemed as though he were already drunk.

"Yo, kid, you can't be here." The barkeep said as Zexion approached. Silently, he took his false ID from his wallet, laid in on the counter, and took a seat. The man looked at it skeptically, but after a moment passed it back.

"What can I do for you?"

"A cosmopolitan, please. Make it tall and strong. No ice."

A moment later his drink was in front of him. The look the bartender gave him was an odd one; he couldn't determine whether it was suspicion or pity, but both made him uncomfortable. He tipped his glass back, drained it, and set it back down on the counter. The alcohol felt warm and pleasant as it slid down his throat and traveled through his body. Strange for him to think that once he had hated that feeling, and now he craved it.

"Another."

"That was fast."

"I'm not here for the endearing atmosphere." He responded dryly.

"And you're sure you're old enough to be in here?"

"You saw my identification, didn't you?"

The bartender clearly didn't believe he was of age, but he said nothing else and instead turned to make another cosmo. Zexion drank his second drink just a bit more slowly, if not by much. By the time he had finished his head buzzed and his muscles felt much looser. He pulled a cigarette from his pack and lit it, smoked in silence, spoke to nobody - he simply slid his glass across the counter to request another drink.

Just as he was finishing fourth, the door opened with a slight creak and another customer entered the bar. He paid no attention whatsoever until a small hand rested itself on his shoulder. He looked up.

Roxas' blue eyes stared at him almost mournfully from the next stool.

"Roxas? What're you doing here?"

Roxas eyed the cosmo. "The same thing as you, it looks like." He laid his ID on the counter and turned to the bartender. "Rum and coke, please."

They drank together quietly for a few long moments, each thinking of their own troubles.

"You know, I was with Axel last night." Roxas finally said, his voice quiet. "But I left before he woke up this morning. He's probably going to hate me now. "

"I'm not entirely certain that Axel is capable of hating anything."

"But I just...left. I mean, it's not like I didn't enjoy myself, or like I don't want to see him again. But Christmas is really hard for me ever since my parents died. Every year it's the same thing, I hate seeing all these people walking around happy, thinking about how they'll be spending time with their families while mine is gone. I really can't stand it. I don't...I don't mind seeing you, though. I mean not just because you aren't happy, but more because we're a lot alike."

Zexion felt the urge to scream at him, to say,_ no, stop, don't tell me these things, don't get close to me, I'll hurt you just like I hurt everyone else._ But he didn't say any of those things, because he liked the blonde boy and he did feel a sort of kinship with him. Instead, he said: "Yes, we are, aren't we?"

"You're the only one I feel comfortable around at the hospital. Everyone else, they just...don't seem real. And I keep running into you in places like this. So I figure, you must have a problem too."

"I don't have a problem." Zexion said, more quickly than was necessary. The words hung in the air for a second, heavy. He felt uneasy. "I...should go back to the hospital. Dem was still asleep when I left. He's probably...worried..."

"Yeah, okay. Look, Zex - what I said - maybe it isn't true..."

"What worries me is that it very well might be. Goodbye, Roxas." He paused. "And by the way, Axel likes you very much. You should call him. I think he just might understand what you're going through."  
He laid money on the bar to cover his tab, smiled ever so slightly at Roxas, and left the bar.

* * *

_you must have a problem, too.  
_

The words struck Zexion somewhere deep inside, somewhere very close to the heart. A problem? No, he didn't have a problem, or he hadn't - he hadn't thought he had, had never paid the question much mind at all. But now he wondered. He thought of his father. Did _he _know of his own faults and failings? Or was he too drunk to think that far, that deep?

He was bothered that the alcohol had not made him numb, as it usually did. Bothered that he was bothered, that he had not drowned out any negative feeling, that the hurt was still very present with every beat of his heart. Hurt, and longing to see Demyx. He quickened his faltering steps towards the hospital.

"Merry Christmas, Zexion!" Kairi chirped as soon as he entered the lobby. She was clutching Sora - who was dressed, amusingly, as an elf - by the hand, and seemed as though she were just overflowing with holiday cheer.

"Merry Christmas, Kairi. Sora." He nodded to them. Looking at them, he found that he was no longer disgusted (perhaps annoyed by Kairi's chipper, positive outlook, but not disgusted), that he no longer hated the sight of the two together. He realized that he was..._jealous _of them. Jealous, because both of them would live to love each other for as long as they allowed.

When he opened the door to the room, he found Demyx awake and staring out at the water (as he had found him many times before), still clutching the letter.

"Demyx...I'm back..."

The patient turned to look at him. To his alarm, Zexion found that Dem's eyes were watery, as if he were ready to cry. "I knew you would be." He said softly.

"I'm so sorry I left."

"...why? Why did you leave? I wanted to...wake up to you." He sniffled. "I'm sorry, I'm being ridiculous, I just - "

"No, you aren't being ridiculous." He assured. He stumbled over to the hospital bed and crawled into it, laying his head on Demyx's chest. It was a relief every single time to hear his heart still beating. "It was wrong and I shouldn't have - have done something like that. I did it because...because I think, I think what Roxas said is right, I think I have a _problem_ and for once in my life I'm unsure how I should solve it. Stop? Stop what I have been doing? That's the most obvious, but I don't think that it will be that easy."

"Nothing in life is easy, Zex. It wouldn't be worth living if it were."

He closed his eyes and listened to the steady thumping of that heartbeat, let it comfort him. In part he still doubted that life _was _worth the living; but Demyx loved it, and he loved Demyx, and therefore he loved what Demyx loved. He supposed he and life would have to come to some kind of truce.

And in that moment he was grateful that he had met someone like Dem, whatever the circumstances, grateful that he was loved, grateful that he could lie there and listen and worry not at all that he would be judged or hated or accused. Demyx didn't mention that he smelled like alcohol and smoke or that his words were slightly slurred. He simply loved, freely and unconditionally.

He wished he could be like that.

The thought occured to him suddenly that perhaps one day he could be. Maybe, in time, he could learn to be that kind of person; only he thought it would be hard when his teacher was gone. Still, nonetheless, Demyx wanted him to live and grow. He supposed he would have to figure out a way to do it on his own.

"I love you, Demyx." He whispered softly and opened his eyes to look in Dem's.

The blonde smiled. "I love you, too. Merry Christmas, Zex."

"Merry Christmas."


	16. Day Fifteen

**A/N: **So, day fifteen. I almost can't believe we made it this far - this is the longest thing I've ever written, and to think it's not even done yet! Thanks to everyone who has reviewed and everyone who is reading, you guys are amazing and I love you more than chocolate cheesecake. Which is a lot just so you know.

Enjoy!

(and maybe think about possibly reviewing so I don't have to eat a bunch of chocolate cheescake and have a heart attack or something equally stupid :) )

* * *

**~Red Sky (Frustration)~ **

* * *

Demyx was beautiful when he slept. His thin face was slack, vaguely contented, lips turned up just slightly, hint of a dreamy smile. Zexion watched him - watching the blonde do anything at all had quickly become a favorite past time in this new life of his, be he found a special joy in watching him dream.

He watched, almost transfixed by Dem's blissful expression and the rise and fal of his chest, the evidence that the man he loved was still breathing, that his tired heart was still fighting to beat. Outside, the dawn sky was a vibrant red color that was much too startling and bold for a Chciago winter. It was interesting, but not nearly as much as Demyx's dreaming smile, and he paid it little mind.

Had he applied the elements of ltierature - which he was so familiar with - to his own life, he might have forseen the coming of the storm. Had he remembered that life often imitates art, he might have heard the thunder crackling ominously in the near future.

When the sun had ascended fully to its sky-throne, Zexion pulled himself from the hospital bed and into his uniform. Community service called, and he couldn't shirk it anymore than he already had. Even if he was loathe to leave Demyx.

He opened the door and got a face full of black fabric hanging over a bony chest. The scent of weed, cigarettes, sex, and what might have been coffee radiated off of the offending clothing, a positive identifier. He knew exactly who it was before he even looked up.

"Yo, Zex. What's up?"

He smiled, an expression which still felt stiff and awkward on his lips because it was genuine. Maybe the muscles were moving in the same way, but somehow a real smile felt different than an artificial one. Not that he was complaining, really, it was just unusual. But then, so were a lot of things lately.

"Hey, Axel. How was your Christmas?"

Axel's grin - which seemed permanently plastered on his face in one form or another - widened considerably. "Spent it with Roxy," he wiggled his eyebrows "so pretty fucking great, actually. He wasn't there Christmas morning...but he came 'd you do? Spend it with Demyx?"

"That's exactly how I spent it. I assume that you're coming to see him, as you're currently standing outside his room?"

"Great deduction, Holmes."

He swatted him lightly. "Whatever. He is asleep, but he will probably wake up soon. Very rarely does he sleep in."

"Yeah, I remember, he was always like that. Well, except when he's hungover."

Zexion laughed just slightly at the thought of that, at the sudden mental image of Demyx dragging himself to the bathroom like a wet and offended cat. He edged past Axel, trading places with him.

The hospital's holiday decorations seemed a little deflated, as if they knew they were living on borrowed time. He took the elevator down to the nurses' station, gathered up the mail, and started on his route.

There was, predictably, more mail to hand out than usual - Christmas tended to inspire people to write their afflicted loved ones, to send them cards and letters and pictures.

His heart nearly stopped when he saw the letter addressed: _Demyx Myede, room 669. _It was the smae simple, effeminate handwriting, same kind of plain envelope as the first letter he'd ever handed Demyx. He was certain he knew who it was from; he tucked it into his waistband. Before Dem ever saw it, he would.

He was halfway through passing out the mail when his phone vibrated against his thigh. The screen read 'New TXT MSG - Axel.'

_Demyx. Come quick._

He dropped the bag. Mail skittered everywhere, but he neither noticed or cared. He turned heel and ran for all the world like a madman, flung himself up six flights of stairs because something was wrong and he didn't have time to _sit _and _wait _for a goddamn _elevator. _The edges of the envelope poked the soft skin under his ribs, but he didn't care about that, either.

He got there before the doctors did. Demyx was doubled over the side of the bed, retching. "Zex - zexion..." he whimpered. Axel was kneeling beside him, holding back his hair with weathered hands. Zexion pushed him aside and took over. He could feel the scabs and scars on his scalp.

Demyx looked at him. Seeing fear in those blue eyes, usually peaceful, terrified him, but he used everything he'd ever learned to keep it from showing. Used every lie, every fake smile, every false word, every pull of the strings.

"I'm here." He promised. "I love you."

"I'm _scared..."_

"I know. But you'll be okay. They'll fix it."

Dem rethced again, and Zexion was alarmed to see it was nothing but blood. He had just opened his mouth to scream 'where the fuck are these doctors?' when they rushed in. Before they could be pried for each other, he turned Demyx towards him and kissed him on the lips.

The next instant, they were apart.

The heart monitor was beating much too rapidly. He watched as they checked vitals, whispered, made split second guesses about what was happening. The look on their faces was far from comforting. A tight ball of sickening fear made it's home in his chest as they loaded their patient onto a stretcher.

Zex followed them while they rushed and wanted them to rush faster. He dogged their heels down several hallways and two floors before he was finally stopped by a nurse with thick, brown hair in a single braid and kind hazel eyes.

"I'm sorry, but you can't pass - not right now."

"But I love him."

Tears welled up. He couldn't stop them from spilling over, and didn't try. The nurse with the kind eyes opened her arms. He melted into them and sobbed, openly and freely. Somewhere in the back of his mind something whispered that crying in the arms of a complete stranger wasn't like him at all. _No, _he corrected himself. _It's not like the person I was. _

Demyx had changed everything.

The thought inspired a fresh wave of tears.

"I'm sorry, sweetie." The nurse said. Zexion liked her; he felt warm in her embrace, almost safe, and he wondered if this was what it was like to have a real mother.

"He saved me." He said when he had finally run out of tears. The nurse handed him a travel packet of Kleenex. "And I'm helpless to do the same for him. It is not fair that I am living while he is dying. It should be the other way around. Thank you for letting me cry on you. I'm sorry I got your uniform wet."

"It's no problem." She smiled. She took out a pen and a scap of paper from a small notepad, jotted down a number and the name 'Olette' beside it. "Call me if you ever need anything - even just to talk."

"Thanks. My name is Zexion." He smiled back at her, and that she could make him at a time like that was a small miracle.

* * *

Axel was in the hospital cafeteria when Roxas found him, pushing a small lump of mashed potatoes across his plate listlessly. There were several things wrong with this picture - the first being that nobody ordered the hospital's mashed potatoes, because they were gross. The second was that Axel never did anything _listlessly _- Roxas had known him for all of two weeks, and that was more time than it took to realize that the guy was like the fucking Energizer bunny.

It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that something was wrong.

He sat in the seat right across from Axel and slid the plate away, wrinkling his nose at it in distaste. "God, Ax, did you have to pick the worst food in the whole cafeteria?"

A grin flickered across Axel's face just briefly, then disappeared again.

"What's going on?"

"Dem's dying. More than usual, I mean. It shouldn't bother me this much, it's not like I've never lost anyone before - Momma, you know, and some others - sometimes the boys wouldn't make it, but Xiggy always made me take care of them, some of 'em died right there in my arms. Lost friends too, to overdoses and gang violence, everything. It really shouldn't affect me this much, but Dem..." he trailed off, and his voice got soft, a volume level which Roxas was previously unaware he possessed. "Dem was my best friend."

Roxas stared at Axel, blinked, tried to take in the full meaning of his words.

Maybe he didn't know the whole story, only the bits and pieces Axel had shared with him, but he didn't need to contextualize it to understand that it was painful. And that pain was a weight, yet somehow - somehow Axel walked around just like a cat, light on his feet. Which was exactly why it was difficult for Roxas to process this revelation. How could someone who had seen so much be so unburdened? So...happy?

When the redhead spoke of his time on the streets, he had never mentioned any of it. The boys dying in his arms, losing his friends to senselessness. Horrible, Roxas thought. He reached across the table and took Axel's hand.

"Come on, let's go somewhere. The hospital smell doesn't make this any easier."

If Axel didn't want to move, his body certainly betrayed him, stored kinetic energy begging for release.

"Where're we going, Rox?" He murmured.

Roxas shrugged. "Somewhere. Your apartment maybe. The park. Anywhere, wherever."

"Don't you have to finish your community service?"

"Fuck it. I'd rather be with you."

Another grin appeared and this one lingered for a moment or two; it made Roxas feel something warm and bright that started in his chest and radiated down through all his body, his stomach and to the very tips of his fingers and toes. Like a small sun had devoured his heart.

"How's Zexion handling it?" He asked.

"The last I saw of him was his back. He was chasing the doctors to ICU or wherever they were taking him. But probably not well."

"Probably not." Roxas agreed, sighing. "He's the reason I cam back yesterday, you know."

The expression on Axel's face was a blend of hurt, shock, and confusion.

"I thought you would hate me for leaving. And for being such an unholy mess. But he said - he said you really liked me, said you'd forgive me, said I should stop wasting time."

"I don't like you, Roxas." Axel said, and the world ground to a terrible halt. The inner sun flickered and went out, leaving cold devastation in its wake. "I love you."

The sun came back brighter than ever, and Roxas was completely terrified, completely at a loss. But he looked at Axel and he knew. Knew it deep in his bones, in his marrow. Knowledge engaged in an epic but brief battle against fear. Knowledge won.

"I love you, too."

Axel's mouth dropped into a little 'o' and hung there for a solid moment, as if he hadn't been expecting an answer like that at all and didn't quite know what to do with it. Roxas solved that problem by standing up on his tiptoes and kissing him right there on his open lips.

"Just...just don't die, okay, _please..._" Roxas murmured.

Axel, in a rare moment of forethought, didn't mention that they were all going to die someday. Instead, he wrapped his arms around Roxas and kissed him back, deeper, over and over again until his lips were raw, and said: "Yeah. Okay. You too."

He ignored the stares of passers-by and the honks of irate drivers who had never experienced true love, for if they had, they would have realized that when it happens, small things like gender were just non-issues. Besides, it was 20-fucking-10, did it really matter who they loved?

"Let's go home." said Roxas, and Axel was thrilled because Rox never called _anywhere _home and now it was a title reserved for his apartment. Theirs, maybe. Hopefully. He smiled, and this one lasted.

_Thanks, Dem._

* * *

Zexion waited.

Somewhere along the line he had gotten used to the sick-antiseptic smell of the hospital, but now it was nearly nauseating, the way it bore down on all his senses. It was more than just a _scent_- it was a feeling that crawled under his skin and spine and made the hair on the back of his neck stand up. He wanted a drink, so very badly, but he wouldn't move from his post.

Olette sat with him when she could. When she had time, or when she was on break. They talked about small things and large things, inconsequential things and important things, and she made him laugh a total of three times. He liked her presence. It was comforting.

But she couldn't be there all the time, and it was terrible to be alone there; it was ironic, he thought, that he'd spent so much time forcing himself into isolation and now, after he had decided to participate in humanity again, he saw how horrifying it truly was. He was certain he was going insane, really losing it, quiet and bright lights driving him inch by inch.

Apathy, oh, to not _feel _anything right now. What he would give for it, though he knew that he would _really, verifiably _be alone if he went down that path right now, if he went back. But he wanted to numb it so badly. Demyx was there just on the other side of those doors and he couldn't see him yet, couldn't know if he was alive or dead. He didn't know anything. It was so...so frustrating.

Since Demyx, nothing had ever been the same.

After some time of sitting there by himself he remembered that the constant poke underneath his ribcage was the edge of an envelope, edge of Demyx's letter. Or, well, the one that had been written to him.

Very carefully he removed it from his waistband and opened it. The paper was just regular college-ruled notebook paper, and the letter was hand written.

* * *

_Christmas was always your favorite holiday, wasn't it?_

_Well, Merry Christmas. I'm sorry about all of this. It's a real fucking shame, you know? And I'm sorry I don't come to visit, it's just - I don't really like sick people, think I'd probably puke or something if I went there, and that's no real help to you at all, is it?_

_Wish there was something else I could do. You were always real cute, I liked it when you'd curl up to me, let me read you something - old stuff, it never really seemed to matter much to me but it was like you found some secret importance in every word. I mean, good you had something you liked._

_You still see any of the boys? None of them really come around here to see me anymore. Saix sometimes. And Riku. If you see 'em, tell 'em I'm sorry, tell 'em I miss 'em. I mean, at least I fed you guys, right?_

_You didn't answer my last letter. I wonder if it's because you can't read, or if it's because you're already dead._

_Love,_

_Xig._

* * *

Zexion stared, almost disbelieving, at the short letter (though it was more like a note). It took every bit of restraint he had not to crush the paper between his fingers, or shred it, or catch it on fire. He hated _sick _people, yet he was the one who had - and he couldn't even grit his teeth and bear it, for Demyx? Yeah, at least he fed them, but it didn't really matter now, not when his stupid bullshit had killed the most perfect man he'd ever have the chance to meet. Was he really so blind he couldn't see that about Dem?

In all honestly, Zexion wanted to kill him. Slowly, and painfully.

He didn't think Demyx would like that very much, so he stayed put and pushed the thought away. He reread the paragraph about the books again, and smiled to himself at the idea of those blue eyes all lit up, excited, listening carefully to every word.

Olette's head suddenly appeared through the doorway.

"You can see him now."


	17. Day Sixteen

So, it's definitely been a while since I updated this story - but the good news is, I'm here with a new chapter and I intend to keep writing it, hopefully at a faster pace now that my life has become a little less hectic.

Happy holidays and I hope you enjoy!

P.S: Reviews make great stocking-stuffers.

* * *

** ~ Slipping ((This is Going to Hurt)) ~**

* * *

He followed Olette through the white labyrinth that comprised Castle Memorial's Intensive Care Unit. The sterile smell was enough to make his nose burn; his head ached and he was exhausted, but none of this mattered because he was going to see Demyx. More importantly, he would be seeing Demyx alive, though in what condition he wasn't sure.

It seemed to take much too long to reach the room, every foot like a mile. When they finally arrived, Zexion took a deep breath to steel himself. Olette hugged him, and he opened the door.

Dem's blue eyes were clouded with morphine. They reminded Zexion of morning fog over the lake. He nearly ran to Demyx's side and took his hand, careful not to disturb the wires that snaked from the patient's body.

"Zexion."

"I'm here." He whispered. "How do you feel?"

"Okay...now that you're here. The morphine makes the pain stop, and you - you make me so happy. When I see you, I have hope."

"You have no idea how much hope you give me." He responded quietly, tears coming to his eyes.

"Zex...oh, Zex...I'm sorry...that you have to be hurt by this. I'm sorry...that I couldn't promise you forever. But I knew from the moment we met that it was completely...inescapable. Falling in love with you."

He sniffled and squeezed Demyx's hand lightly, trying to focus on anything but crying any more than he already was. Demyx looked so frail, so weak, even more so than normal - his skin was hot with fever, and a machine helped him to breathe. Zexion knew it was his turn to be strong.

"At least you knew." He said. "I was completely blindsided."

Dem smiled. "I know. It was kinda cute."

"It was unavoidable, because I was blind. But you make me see. How will I..."

"You'll survive. You promised me you would at least...at least try. Please...keep it. I can't bear to think of a world without you in it."

"How do you think I feel?" said Zexion, his voice quiet and trembling.

At that moment, there was a knock on the door, and Olette entered the room. "Zexion, may I speak with you privately?"

"Demyx, I'll be right back." He promised, and went out into the hallway with the nurse. "What is it?"

"The doctor is on his way here to explain all of this to him. I - I thought I would let you know what's going. Demyx is suffering from septic shock, which means that an infection in his blood has caused him to go into shock. It's begun to affect his organs, which are showing signs of failing - "

"Isn't there anything you can do?"

She shook her head slowly, sadly. "He's too far gone. I'm sorry."

"How long?"

"He might have a couple of days, but I don't think he'll be so lucky."

It hit him like a wrecking ball. He'd known something like this was coming, yet that didn't make it any easier to hear, didn't make it hurt any less. The little time he'd had to prepare himself seemed completely inadequate, but then he doubted anything could have prepared him for something so incredibly painful. His chest tightened, and he felt like he couldn't breathe - like the pain, thick and heavy, had coalesced in one place and blocked his airways.

"Breathe." Olette instructed, guiding him to a chair. Her hands on his shoulders forced him into it. He went down without much of a fight. "Breathe in."

He sucked in a deep breath. It exploded out of him in a heart wrenching sob, the tears he had struggled to hold back inside Dem's room flooding his eyes. They streamed down in his face in small torrents.

"Dem." He cried.

He heard two pairs of footsteps off to the side. One, he assumed, belonged to the doctor. When he looked, he found to his complete shock that the other pair belonged to Larxene. Part of him, the part that once had been callous and cold, was embarrassed to be seen like that. But Demyx had turned that part of him into nothing more than a small, meek voice, and he cried harder; he was surprised to see her, and every other part of him was so incredibly glad she was there.

She went to his side and wrapped her arms around his thin, quaking shoulders. He cried into the fabric of her shirt.

"Axel called and told me what happened, said you might need me here. I'm so sorry, Zex."

"His organs are starting to fail, Larx, it's not fair. I need more time with him. It's not even fair that he's dying in the first place, I still can't get over it. Why does someone like me get to exist, but someone like him has to die? But there's nothing we can do. I just want...more time."

"Zexion, when my father died I realized that when it comes down to it, that's all we want - more time, even though we'll never get it. My dad was gone in the blink of any eye but I would do anything just to see him for one more moment. You have at least that long, don't you?"

"Y- yeah."

"So enjoy every second you have left."

"Touche." He sniffled. His sobs had subsided, but tears were still spilling down his face. "Thanks. For coming, and for telling me that, because I've really got to get it together. At least until - after - I don't want to spend what time is left crying. I want to spend it with him."

"He really did change you, you know." She said softly. She smiled at him, and it was genuine, lacking its usual sharp edge.

"I know. I just don't know what I'm going to do without him."

"I don't know either. But I have total confidence that you'll figure it out."

The doctor emerged from Demyx's room. Zexion rose from the chair. "I have to go be with him."

She nodded. He hugged her, and walked towards the room in which he knew now that Demyx would die. It was a harsh reality to face. He did not find the blonde staring out the window as he had expected, but instead looking at the door almost as if he were waiting for him to return. Zexion still felt shaky, as if he might unravel any second, but he forced himself to smile for the man he loved. He remembered that he had done this exact same thing the first time they'd ever met, but then the reason had been drastically different. Then, it had been hard to smile because he hadn't cared at all. Now it was hard because he cared too much.

"They told you...didn't they? That's what the nurse..."

"Yes. She told me."

"I'm going to hold on as long as...as long as I can."

"I'll be here. I've already called off of work for tonight, and I'll take off the rest of the week."

Demyx smiled. His eyelids fluttered closed, stayed that way for a moment, then opened again. "Sorry." he murmured. "I'm really tired."

"So sleep. I'm not leaving - I'll be here when you wake up."

"Promise?"

"I promise."

And so Demyx slept.

* * *

"...Okay, Larxene, thanks for calling. See you then." Axel hung up the phone and set it on the kitchen counter. He swallowed thickly, and his eyes felt wet; like Zexion, he'd known it was coming, but it was difficult for Axel for a different reason. For many years he'd wondered where Demyx was, and now, so soon after finding him, another one of his friends would die as a result of Xigbar's selfish indifference.

He was worried for Zexion, and glad Larxene had gone to see him.

"Roxas" he called, walking toward the bedroom. The blonde was awake but still laying in bed, pretty much exactly where Axel had left him.

"What's going on?"

"Larxene went to see Zexion at the hospital. He told her that Demyx's body is failing him. She's going to pick me up later so that I can go say goodbye to him. "

"I'll come with you.I'm sorry, A...I know you were good friends with him."

"I remember him before he got sick. He was a real good kid - always smiling, real bright even in these shitty places that we lived. Like he was happy just to be alive. I have some pictures of him from back then...do you think Zex would want them?"

Roxas nodded. "I think he would."

Axel went to his closet and pulled down from the top shelf a small, metal box. He set it on the bed, then sat down and opened it. Inside lay piles of Polaroid photographs. "Welcome to my past, Roxas."

The boy leaned forward on his elbow and picked up a picture. In it was a boy with lustrous silver hair that was tied back in a ponytail, posing for the camera with a mischievous grin on his face. "Who is this?"

"That's Riku."

"And this?"

"That...that's Cloud. He was fourteen when he died. We think it was peaceful - I came in one morning to check on him, and he was dead." Axel sighed, and picked up a picture. "Here's one of Demyx."

"Wow, he looks - you're right, he looks happy."

"He was. Always, about everything."

"Axel...why do you keep these pictures?"

"Because if I don't remember them, who will? These boys, they were my family. Most of them are dead. Some are still alive, we still see each other - but most of them are gone. They were strays, just like me, and nobody else - they have nobody else to honor their memory. So I do." He smiled fondly, looking at Cloud's picture. "Not to mention, I told you, this is my past. Really the only proof that I ever had one."

Roxas kissed him, and they laid in bed, looking at old photographs until Larxene arrived much later to pick them up.

* * *

Zexion watched Demyx sleep. It was not the first time, only now it seemed to mean even more. He treasured each breath, each beep of the heart monitor; he could feel death hanging over them like a dark cloud, and he was glad Demyx slept because he was almost certain he could feel it, too. He didn't want Dem to be frightened. But then, perhaps he wasn't. After all this time his pain would finally come to an end.

_But mine is just beginning_, he thought.

He wondered why he had ever done such a thing in the first place, such a foolish thing to fall in love. But when he looked at Demyx he knew that what he had said was true - it was inevitable. There was no escaping it. How could he _not _have loved someone like him?

Why Demyx loved him, he still wasn't sure. But it seemed like a waste of time to worry about it anymore, because regardless of the _why_, Zexion was glad that he did. That Dem loved him. And there was something about being constantly amazed by the person he loved that was refreshing, though in some ways it only made his fear worse. He had become addicted to that feeling, and now he would be forced to quit cold turkey.

He closed his eyes. He had just begun to fall asleep himself when there was another knock on the door. "Who is it?" He asked.

"Axel."

"Come in."

He slipped into the room. "Hey, Zex. How is he? How are you?"

"Sleeping, as you can see. I'm - let's not even talk about how I am. It's very difficult, to say the least."

Axel rested one hand on Zexion's shoulder, and said nothing. They stood like this for a while, silent, until Demyx's eyes opened, and a weak smile spread across his lips. "Hey, Ax."

"I'll give you two a minute." Zexion said, rising from his seat. Axel reached into his pocket and pulled out a collection of photographs.

"I thought you might like these."

"...Thank you." He said, somewhat confused - but the confusion cleared as soon as he stepped into the waiting room and glanced at the first photograph. It was of Demyx. They all were. In one, the boy was smiling directly into the camera, strumming what looked like an old, beat up sitar; in another he was playing a card game which his expression revealed he was losing; in another, he was sitting in a beanbag chair, just smoking a cigarette and smiling like he had the world.

In all of them, he was young, and healthy.

Zexion smiled.

"Axel's really good at taking pictures, isn't he?" Roxas said from the chair he was waiting in. Zexion was startled - he hadn't even noticed the boy was there.

"Yes, it would...appear so."

"Do you like them?"

He nodded. It was something so small, but now in his hands he had tangible proof that Demyx once had lived. He knew that after Dem died, he would take great comfort in this. "More than you could ever know."

* * *

Axel sat in the chair his friend had just vacated. Demyx looked weak, but the smile on his face was comforting.

"Listen, Dem...I have a lot to say, and I know there's not a whole lot of time left. So I'll try to make this quick. I'm sorry that I listened to Xigbar, that I believed him, that you just wanted to leave us. We should have known it had something to do with your health. I always wondered what had happened to you and I should have found out, I should have been here for you this whole time. I'm so sorry for that, kid. You're one of the best friends I've ever had."

"...I'm just...glad you came. Remember...when I first met you, I thought...I was going to die. It's only fitting that you...came now, too. But just...like then..I still have a little life left in me."

"For Zex right?"  
He nodded. "When he's with me...I feel..."

"Like you have a heart?"

He smiled. "Yeah. Exactly...like that."

Axel stood up. "I'll take my leave now - I'm sure you want to be with him. I just...came to say...that you're one of the best I've ever known. And to say...goodbye, kid."

"Goodbye, Axel. I'm glad...I met you."

With tears in his eyes, Axel headed for the hallway to retrieve Zexion. He knew it was the last time he would ever see Demyx alive.


	18. Day Seventeen

I'm going to preface this chapter by apologizing for its lack of length, but I hope the content and quality make up for the quantity. It's a heavy chapter, and I didn't want to bog it down with anything unnecessary. And, as always, I hope you enjoy it :)

* * *

**Dying (Fly South)**

* * *

_"A__nd I rationed my breaths as I said to myself  
That I'd already taken too much today  
As each descending peak on the LCD  
took you a little farther away from me."  
- What Sarah Said, Death Cab for Cutie_

* * *

Once Zexion had returned to Demyx's side, Axel sat down beside Roxas. He had not been able to stop himself from silently but openly crying.

"Are you okay?" Roxas asked.

"I will be. It's just hard to lose another friend. Me and Dem, we were really close. I should have done something, we all should have done something - we all knew what was going on, what Xigbar was - we could have just...stopped it. All of us together, hell, even a few of us, we could have...stopped him."

"I love you." said Roxas, because it was the most comforting thing he could think to say and because it was true.

"Thank you." He said, and put his arms around the boy. "I love you too."

They sat in silence for a while. Eventually, Roxas asked, "How's Zexion holding up?"

"I don't think we'll know 'til it's all over. Zex is good at hiding how he feels. But Rox, you can see it in his eyes - the way he looks at Demyx. Like he can't imagine how the world could keep turning without him."

"It's strange what love can do."

"Yeah. It kind of is."

Larxene rounded the corner, snacking on a small fry from the hospital cafeteria. "God, I was starving. Is Zexion with Demyx?"

"Yeah. Thanks for bringing us here, and taking my advice. I know it means a lot to Zexion that you're here."

"Did you get to -

"Say goodbye? Yeah."

"I can take you home, if you'd like."

Axel nodded, and stood up. Roxas did the same, and they left the hospital.

* * *

Zexion started to sit down at Demyx's bed side, but Demyx stopped him, grabbing his wrist. His grip was weak, but the intent was enough to make Zexion stop and look at him.

"What is it?" He asked, fear nesting somewhere deep inside his heart.

"Lay with me. Please..we'll be careful of the wires, I just...I want you next to me."

"Alright." He said, because he couldn't deny Demyx that, not now, and he wanted to be close to him. Though it took some careful thought and arranging, he was able to squeeze in beside Demyx. They laid like this for a while before someone knocked on the door.

"It's Larxene." The visitor announced.

"Do you want to meet her?" Zexion asked. Demyx nodded his assent, and he bid her to come in. She walked over to the hospital bed and looked at the patient. "Hi." She said. "I'm Larxene. As you just heard."

"Nice...to meet you. You're...his best friend...right?"

"Yeah."

He took her hand. His were cold and thin. "Look after him for me."

"I will. Of course I will."

"Thank you."

She stayed for a moment longer, but soon felt as though she were intruding on something private, something better left between Zexion and his love. She could tell Demyx didn't have much strength left, but she was glad to have met him at least once. "Zex, I'll be in the waiting room, okay?"

"Okay." he said, and she left. Within minutes both boys were asleep, but Zexion was haunted with nightmares all through the night.

* * *

"Zexion...Zexion...wake up."

He was called to consciousness by a whisper that could belong only to Demyx, and when he opened his eyes he was staring directly into Dem's. There was a kind of finality in them, and Zexion suddenly felt as though he'd swallowed a bullet. The end was near. Death circled overhead much like a vulture waiting to descend on its prey.

Tears sprang to his eyes; he couldn't stop them and he didn't try. There seemed so much more to say, and do, and time was running out, slipping away as easily as so many grains of sand through his fingers.

"The lake...it's so beautiful this morning. It's frozen. I'm glad...I can still see it from here."

"Do you still want to know where the ducks go?"

"...Yeah."

"They fly south, Demyx." He whispered, a slight smile on his lips. "They fly south. But do you want to know something else?"

"Yeah?"

"I was like a bird who had forgotten how to fly , and I was freezing the chill of winter. But then I met you, and you showed me." His tears began to flow faster. He kissed Demyx's temple. "I just don't know where to go without you."

"..Achieve everything you ever dreamed of. And I...will be watching you, your own personal guardian angel...I swear." Demyx said quietly. "You made this okay. If I had never gotten sick, I would have never met you. These past weeks...have made everything worth it."

"I will always, always love you."

"I love you, too. And love, Zex, is stronger than death."

His face twisted with pain, and Zexion knew that the morphine was no longer enough to dull it. Death was closing in, but Demyx fought.

"Zex..."

"Don't suffer on my account." He said gently. They were the hardest words he had ever spoken, but to watch Demyx suffer was harder still. "If it's time...if it's too much to bear...let go."

This seemed to be the permission Demyx needed. He smiled serenely, and Zexion watched the life go out of his eyes. He knew that the man he loved was gone even before the machines told him, before the beeping of the heart monitor became one shrill drone, because he had seen that light go out. Just like a candle flame suddenly extinguished.

He felt his world go cold and colorless. He remained there, holding onto Dem's body as long as the hospital staff would allow it; eventually Larxene came in and pulled him away. He let her guide him through the white maze of the hospital and into the parking lot. A biting, cold wind howled in his ears and stung his face.

He knew they were going back to the apartment long before she put him the car. There was nothing left for him at Castle Memorial. With shaking hands he lit a cigarette, but the nicotine did nothing to make him feel better or calm his nerves. The feeling of unraveling at his very core pervaded, stronger than ever, but he struggled not to come apart. To do so seemed a dishonor to Demyx.  
When they were near to the apartment, he said, "Please tell me you have alcohol. I need a drink."

"I just bought a bottle yesterday."

"Good."

* * *

Larxene watched her best friend sit at their table and drink. The bottle was in front of him; he had forgone glasses and mixed drinks and had already killed a third of the vodka straight from the neck. He seemed to be attempting to give renewed meaning to the phrase 'drowning your sorrows', though she doubted it would work.

She was more concerned for them than she ever had been. Even when Axel had brought him home in the midst of a panic attack, she had known he would be alright. That he would break had been inevitable and obvious to the few people he allowed close to him, but nobody knew what would happen now. The foundation of his new reality had been ripped away.

He took another long swig and broke the silence he had been holding since their brief conversation in the car. He hadn't stopped crying since she had pulled him away from Demyx's lifeless body, but he did not seem to notice his own tears. "He's gone. I will never see him again, or speak to him, or tell him I love him. All my life his memory will hang over me like a cloud. I will never escape it." His voice was soft and slurred, but she could understand him.

He drank again. She pulled him from his seat and led him to the couch; he offered no resistance, and she didn't think he would have even if he had been trying to mortally wound him.

When they sat down, he sagged against her. She stroked his hair. Her normally quick wit offered her no comforting words - everything she might think to say paled in the face of what he had lost.

"I don't understand why this had to happen to him." He continued. "I would rather he lived, healthy, and never met me, rather I lived suffering in that cold world until I froze and died. I don't know what to do. I'm so..._fucked. _What kind of cruel, twisted world takes him and keeps _me?"_

He began to sob. The sound of it made her want to tear out her heart. She didn't know how hat to do for him.

Eventually she helped him to bed. By then his cries had subsided to low, broken moans that were less violent but no less disturbing.

She looked at him lying half-conscious in his bed and felt an aching sadness for him. His parents had never loved or cared for him; their selfish indifference and his mother's cruelty had turned his heart to stone, and the one person who had made him hope was gone.

She supposed she would feel empty, too.

* * *

He slept only with the aid of the alcohol he had consumed, and for a blessed while he dreamed of nothing. Then it began - he dreamed of trains making wreckage to their monstrous bodies as they crashed head on, could hear the grating and growling of the metal beasts and felt, always, as though he were trapped between them. He felt no fear, only the sense that this was how things ought to have been.

The image of the wreckage gave way to the image of the lake, and on it's shores sat Demyx; in this dream neither of them said anything, and Demyx held him, healthy and strong.

He woke, sweat pouring down his forehead. His heart ached as if it were literally broken, and he wondered if it were possible to die of such a thing. He hoped so, because to live seemed impossible - yet he had promised he would try. If only something inside of him would give, then it would be the fault of nothing but grief.

The apartment was still and silent. Larxene was certainly asleep, and her boyfriend. He was alone, and the loneliness pressed down into his bones and marrow like an unshakable weight.

The dream of the lake hung over him, close to him, and it was more terrible than any nightmare he'd ever had. For those sleeping moments it had seemed plausible that Demyx had lived, that he were capable of holding him, that they could sit and say nothing and simply _be. _Waking was a cruel and terrible thing, salt in his wound.

"Demyx." He whispered. He closed his eyes and knew he would not sleep again that night.


	19. Day Eighteen

**Gone (Stronger Than Death)**

* * *

_"Agressively we all defend the role we play _  
_Regrettable, the time's come to send you on your way _  
_We've seen it all _  
_Bonfires of trust and flash floods of pain _  
_...we hope you enjoyed your stay _  
_outside the sun is shining, seems like heaven ain't far away"_

- Exitlude, The Killers

* * *

The sand was freezing beneath his bare feet, but the chill felt good and walking along the shore of the lake brought him some comfort; it paled in comparison to actually being with Demyx, but that was no longer an option. So he settled for being near the lake Dem had loved so much.

It seemed an appropriate place to have the memorial service, and in the distance Zexion could already see people gathering around the small gazebo where the service would be held. It would start within the hour, but he had needed a moment to prepare himself. At first, he hadn't been entirely certain that he would be able to handle saying goodbye to Demyx again, but in the end he had decided that he would have to find it in himself. If he was strong enough to live, he would be strong enough to do this.

Several yards ahead of him, he spotted a mane of red hair that could only belong to Axel. He didn't speed up, but continued walking at a steady pace until he was beside his friend. After a moment, Axel turned to look at him.

"Hey, Zex" he said "how're you doing? And don't give me some bullshit answer...tell me the truth."

"...this is the worst thing that's ever happened to me, and I keep thinking how much worse it must have been for him. I know...I know he loved me, but that's..." he shook his head "I feel empty without him."

"He did love you. A lot. That's worth something, isn't it?"

"It's worth more than you could ever imagine. But nobody else will ever love me, and I don't _want _anyone else. Just him, and now that's impossible."

"There's always the next life, you know."

"...the next life. Do you believe in that?"

"Oh, definitely."

They walked back to the site of Demyx's service, silent as Zexion contemplated the thought of next lives. It was perhaps the most comforting thing he had heard since Demyx had died.

He was surprised to see just how many people had shown up for the service. Some he recognized as orderlies and nurses from the hospital, some from the pictures Axel had given him, and some not at all.

Kairi appeared from within the throng. she rushed over to him and took both of his hands in hers. "Zexion, I'm so sorry." she said, tears in her eyes. He was amazed to see she genuinely felt for him. "I heard all about it - it - it's all so sad. I thought you...you probably don't ever want to see Castle again, so I wanted to lket you know I signed off on all your hours."  
His eyes widened with disbelief. "R-really? I don't have to - to ever - thank you, Kairi." He hugged her. "Thank you so much."

She nodded, returning his embrace. "It was nothing. Really." She said, and the next moment she had disappeared inside the crowd once more, leaving Zexion stunned in her wake. He felt almost like a lead weight had been lifted from his chest - he had been filled with a terrible dread concerning his return to his candy striping duties. To know that he would never have to go back eased that horrible feeling.

"I guess...the brat pack isn't as bad as I thought." he murmured to himself. If Axel heard him, he showed no sign.

"Come on, let's get our seats." said Axel after a moment.

"Thank you for helping me do this. I...really needed the assistance." Zexion admitted as they headed for their seats. Planning the service had seemed a daunting task, and if it had been left to him it might not have gotten done. And certainly not as quickly. But Axel had shown up at the apartment that morning and dragged him from his bed, insisting that he would help Zex with all of the necessary arrangements.

"I know. And you're welcome."

The sat in the front row of folding chairs, where Larxene and Roxas were already waiting. When the sun started to edge closer to the horizon, the hospital's chaplain - who would be leading the service - approached the podium in the center of the gazebo.

He read from the Bible, and Zexion forced himself not to flinch.

Many of the attendees got up to share their memories of Demyx and to speak about how his special light had affected them. Part of Zexion was surprised to hear just how many lives Dem had touched; then he realized he shouldn't be surprised at all, because it often seemed as if Demyx had been put on earth for the sole purpose of illuminating every dark and cold place.

Axel told stories from their past that were both funny and uplifting. This was Zexion's favorite testimony because it granted him a rare glimpse into Demyx's past beyond all the misery of sickness.

Then it was his turn to speak. He approached the podium, glanced at the lake behind him, and took a deep breath. The crowd seemed especially still and silent, and all eyes were on him.

"Before I met Demyx" he began "I was a cold and selfish person. I didn't care about anyone or anything except that which served my own ends, nor did I feel compassion or empathy or - or anything, really. It seemed much easier to live without feeling than to risk feeling pain.  
But I was lying to myself. It was a miserable way to live. Demyx had this incredible way of showing me the truth. And what he showed me - there's not enough time or words to express it. But most importantly, he taught me how to love. This is a gift I shall truly never forget." He wiped away the tears on his cheeks. The chaplain handed him the urn containing Demyx's ashes; as Zexion moved toward the lake, the crowd of mourners rose from their seats and followed him.

He kissed the side of the urn. "Goodbye." He whispered, and scattered the ashes over the lake. then he turned to the crowd.

"Thank you for coming." He said to them. "There's one more thing we'd like to do, if you'd like to participate. Axel is going to hand out balloons and markers, and if you want, you can write your personal goodbyes to Demyx...and then we'll release them. I know it's a bit unconventional. But so was Dem."

Everyone seemed to like this idea, and for the next few minutes all he could hear was the sound of sharpies squeaking against latex. Then Axel began to play Amazing Grace on his guitar, and tears once again spring to his eyes.

On his own balloon, he wrote the last words Demyx had ever said to him: love is stronger than death.

At Zexion's word, they released their balloons, and he watched them fly up over the lake - a myriad of colors carrying messages up to heaven.

* * *

Once the group had begun to disband and disperse, Zexion caught sight of someone standing near the lake, still watching the balloons which had become little more than black specks nearing the clouds. It was not someone he recognized, nor someone who seemed like they belonged there; he knew it was wrong to make such snap judgements, but something about the man in the dark trench coat made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.

Then the man turned towards him, and he knew_. The eye patch, the deep scars along the side of his face - he knew it was Xigbar. Pure, unadulterated fury swept through him and eclipsed everything else inside of him. his reason fled from him, and before he was even fully aware of it he was running across the shore towards the man._

"What the - " Xigbar started to say, but he never got the chance to finish his sentence. Zexion's body slammed into his and they went sprawling across the cold sand.

"Bastard!" Zexion screamed. He'd managed to get on top of Xigbar, and he was furiously pounding him with his fists. He had the advantage of surprise, and from his position he could smell the liquor on Xigbar's breath. His fist collided witht he man's nose, and he felt a satisfying crunch.  
He landed several more hits before Axel and Larxene grabbed him by the arms and pulled him off. He struggled against them, but their grip was strong and he couldn't get free.

"He's dead because of you!" He screamed, still struggling even as his friends dragged him away. "I hope you burn in hell!" He was glad to see blood pouring from Xigbar's nose, but he'd wished he'd had the time to inflict more grievous injuries.

He didn't stop struggling until he was put in Larxene's car. His whole body still shook with rage. Axel crouched down next to his seat, looking him in the eyes.

"Zex, man, calm down, you've - "

"How are you okay

with this? That - that - _scum_ had the _nerve to show up here! Like he ever cared about Demyx, like they were friends, like he didn't - like he didn't - "_

"Breathe,

Zex."

"How can you tell me to breathe?" He yelled, and then all the fight drained out of him at once. He slumped down in the passenger's seat, breathing hard, and the full weight of his exhaustion pressed heavily on him. At Axel's urging, he took several deep, measured breaths until his heart slowed to a normal rate and he could breathe easier.

"I...I really need to go back to the apartment." He said quietly. He looked at Larxene, who was already in the driver's seat.

"Okay." said Axel "Get some rest. You look like you really need it." He shut the door and Larxene began to drive. She was silent the entire ride home..

"You're lucky the cops didn't come, you know." She said once they were inside the apartment. "I understand why you did it. I probably would have done the same thing. But legal trouble is the last thing you need. "

"It would have been worth it."

"I'm sure. But you still need to be more careful."

"Yeah, okay." He murmured. "I'm going to bed. Goodnight, Larxene."

"Goodnight, Zexion."

* * *

Zexion slept.

He didn't want to; he had made a valiant effort to stay awake, trying to lose himself first in a book and then in the pictures that Axel had given him, but it was futile. Sleep claimed him. It was a dark sleep, devoid of dreams, for which Zexion was grateful upon waking to the sound of the train.

He'd slept through it many times before, but this time the piercing whistle roused him. He dragged himself to the window and threw it open, letting the cold air sting his face as he watched the train roll by in the distance. It was only a black silhouette against the night.

He wondered where it was going, as he often had in the past, only now a solution seemed clear to him: if he were really going to survive a world without Demyx, he would have to do it outside of Chicago. The more he thought on it, the more it seemed right in his heart.

He closed his window and went to his closet, unearthing his suitcases from it, and he began to pack. This had to be done as soon as possible - he would wait until morning so that he could bid those he cared for goodbye, and of course he would need the night to decide where to go - but he could not possibly wait any longer than that.

The city seemed oppressive. A fresh start sounded appealing.

Hope glimmered in the distance, and Zexion felt something like excitement as he packed away his life.


	20. Day Nineteen

Wow, so here we are - the final chapter. I intend on writing an epilogue, so stay tuned for that, but this is our official goodbye. What an incredible, awesome journey this has been. This story took me almost three years and a lot of work of to complete, but it was worth it. Thank you to everyone who has reviewed - you don't know how much it means to me that this small little story was able to touch so many of you.

I love each and every one of you.

Ja ne!

* * *

**Station (A New Life)**

* * *

Larxene woke at seven a.m to a knock on her bedroom door. She groaned and dragged herself out of bed and across the room to open it; on the other side, as she had anticipated, was Zexion. She could see in his eyes a deep and pervading sadness, but she saw something else. Determination, and something that resembled hope.

Over his shoulder she caught a glimpse of two suitcases sitting by their front door. Her tired brain struggled to wake up and piece it together.

"Larxene." He started softly. "I'm leaving."

At first, she was surprised, but it faded quickly. She understood why he would feel the need to leave, understood that the city had become little more to him than an oppressive force, though she was was sad to think of it. He had been her best friend for many years. For better or worse, he had always been there.

"Where are you going?" she asked.

"San Francisco. It's close to the ocean, and my family owns a beach house out there that my father has granted me permission to stay in."

"You talked to your father?"

"Desperation is a powerful force." He smiled ruefully, and though she could still see sadness in it, she was glad he was smiling at all. "I have to go get the key from him before I go. My train leaves at ten."

"I'll give you a ride. Just...let me get dressed."

Twenty minutes later, her car was winding through the streets of his old neighborhood, past tall and elaborate houses and driveways filled with the newest and shiniest of cars.

_He who has the most toys, wins_, Zexion thought wryly. _If only life were so simple.  
_  
It seemed like a peaceful place, but he knew it was all smoke and mirrors - the illusion that happiness could somehow be purchased, that status could take the place of love. In a strange way he felt sorry for those who lived there. They would spend their whole lives running a rat race, never realizing that they were little more than hamsters on a wheel, and they would pass their values onto their children who would repeat their mistakes over and over until there was no humanity left in that plastic place.

Larxene pulled up to his parents' house. He took a deep breath to steady himself, his stomach clenching with an almost painful sort of anxiety, and got out of the car.

"Good luck. I'll be waiting for you."

"I don't need luck. But thank you."

He walked slowly, almost reluctantly, up the driveway and knocked three times on the elaborate French doors. If it had been his choice he would have rather collected the key from the mailbox, but his father had insisted on handing it to him personally.

The door swung open. Beth, his parents' housekeeper, stared at him from the other side, looking almost as if she had seen a ghost. The next instant a bright smile spread across her face and she threw her arms around him, hugging him tightly. He couldn't help but laugh. She was a short woman, and her head came only to his chest.

"At least someone's glad to see me." He muttered. "Is my father -

"He's waiting for you in his study."

He followed her down the familiar hallways of his childhood home until they had reached the door to the study. He thanked her, then pushed the door open.

His father sat behind his desk, nursing a glass of scotch and staring at a newspaper that he didn't seem to be reading. He looked up and Zexion saw in his eyes a kind of hollow ache, as if some time long ago he had stopped feeling the full weight of the sadness that plagued him - as if Alexander Hawke had ceased to be a real person, only a caricature. He felt uncannily as though he were staring into the future he would have had if he'd never met Demyx.

"Zexion." His father said softly. "I don't know - why you're leaving town, and I don't expect you to tell me. You can, if you'd like, but somehow I don't think you will. But let me - let me make you a drink, and talk to you for a little bit, and then - then you can go."

He considered this for a moment, then sighed and pulled a chair up to the desk. Alex poured him a scotch. At the first taste he remembered sneaking a drink as a child, thinking it tasted wrong and burned his throat, but now those things were welcome sensations.

"I have something I need to tell you."

"Then tell me. I'm not very patient."  
"You get that from your mother." Zexion flinched at the comparison, but said nothing. "I'm divorcing her."

"Oh? You're not afraid of losing your precious reputation?" He asked sharply, bitter cruelty swelling up in his chest like a cold and callous wave intent on destroying everything in its path; then he thought of Demyx and knew this could not be so. Demyx would have encouraged him to be kind, or at the very least understanding.

He inhaled deeply. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

"No, you had the right. You must know that for a long time our marriage has been - well, over - but we've stayed in the interest of raising you, and yes - saving face. I know it's shameful."

"Did you really think that was good for me, _father? _Surely you must have known I wasn't stupid. Don't pretend you had my interests at heart, because you didn't. If that had been the case, you would have taken me far, far away from her."

Alex looked for all the world as if his son had just struck him, and Zexion kept Dem's face in his mind, tried to calm himself. "You're right. And I'm sorry. I don't think I'll ever be able to make up for that."

"Let me ask you something. Did you ever love her?"

The room was silent for a while. "Yes." Jack said eventually. "Or I should say, I thought I loved her. Maybe I did. I don't really know, but at the time I was quite convinced, and it seemed - right. Like marrying her was the right thing to do. I had my career, my money, and all I needed was a wife. And Camilla, you know, she wasn't always like she is now. She used to enjoy things. And she was very well spoken, and well dressed, and well bred. It seemed like a match made in Heaven. But you know how that turned out."

"Yes, I'm aware. I heard you every night. The two of you taught me nothing but how to be cold, how to manipulate people, how to drink myself to death. Are you proud of the child you raised?"

"Yes." Alex said, and Zexion was the one who looked as though he had been struck. _Proud? _Who would ever be _proud _of him? "I know that wasn't what you were expecting, but I am. I'm proud of you because you're not like me. I can tell, despite all your thoughts to the contrary, that you're not weak. You're strong. You would never let someone like your mother destroy you. You've always stood up to her. So yes, I'm proud of you, though I think you've become who you are in spite of your raising, not because of it. I really...can't take any credit."

Zexion finished his drink and set the empty glass on the desk. "Thank you, father. But I...would like to leave now."

"I'm never going to see you again, am I?"

"I don't know. I haven't figured that out yet. But I won't drop off the face of the earth, not completely. I'll try to call you, or send you a postcard."

"I suppose that's the best I can ask for." He opened the desk drawer and pulled out the key, and a slip of paper which he handed to his son. When he looked, Zexion found it was a check. "I want you...to have something so you can be secure, for a little while."

"This doesn't...fix things, you know," he said, and for a moment considered tearing it up. But Demyx had taught him to take kindness for what it was, and he tucked the check into his coat pocket. "You can't buy my love."

"I know."

He headed for the door, but stopped just before he turned the knob. "But I love you anyway. You're my father, after all."

With that, he left, leaving Alexander stunned and silent in his wake.

* * *

The train station was crowded, filled with people traveling to every imaginable corner of the country. Zexion watched them and wondered where they were going, what drew them there, for what reasons they had all ended up in the same place that morning.

Axel and Roxas had met them at the station, intent on seeing him off. He couldn't help but smile, looking at his friends gathered around him; and he felt confident in saying that these were true friends, people he loved and cared for. He was glad they had come.

_"Now boarding." _An automated female voice said from the speakers above them. He looked at the iron beast that would take him into his new life, just like he had dreamed for so long.

"I guess it's time for me to go, huh?"

"Sounds like it." Said Axel. He scooped Zexion up into a hug, and he laughed, because this time _he _was the short one. But then, anyone was short compared to Axel. "Take care of yourself, Zex. Seriously. And send us lots of postcards, every one you can find, cause I hear San Francisco is gorgeous."  
"It is. I will."

Roxas hugged him next, then Larxene. "Thank you for being my friend." She whispered. "It's been really great. Make sure you come back and visit me."

"Okay. I promise, I will. I've gotta go now...I'll...I'll call you guys when I get there. Thanks for everything. All of you."

He boarded the train. His friends stayed on the platform until the very last, until the train had pulled away.

Zexion stared out the window as they rolled through what seemed like endless fields of corn. He didn't think he would ever stop being sad, but something in him felt hopeful, as though things might be alright - as though his new life might be much better than his old one. He thought of the words that Demyx had once spoken to him, on a cold winter day by a frozen, still lake.

_When you're dying, hope is all that's left._

~Fin~


	21. Epilogue

**Twenty Years Later (And So, We Meet Again)**

* * *

The lake was just as peaceful as it had always been.

Chicago, like the rest of the world, had changed immensely in two decades; every time Zexion returned it seemed even stranger, even further from the city he had grown up in. He was sure how he felt about that. Once, the city had seemed like little more to him than a monstrous, grinding machine hellbent on his destruction. But time and distance had taught him to cherish it. It was the place where he had been born not once, but twice - first from his mother's womb and then from the love of a dying man whom he had never forgotten. He still felt Demyx in the whipping of Chicago's famed wind, in the stirring of the trees and the movement of the water across the lake. That in itself was enough to bring him back again and again.

He approached the shore of the lake and sat down, took off his shoes and socks and slipped his bare feet into the cool water. For a while he sat there silently, deep in thought and memory. He always felt nostalgic when he came to this place. In the distance, he spotted a family of ducks swimming and playing in the water. It made him smile.

"I miss you." He whispered. A few small waves lapped against his ankles, and he knew that was as much of an answer as he was going to get. It would have to be enough.

Time had not healed his wounds, only made them easier to live with. He still bore the weight of his sadness, but he'd become stronger. Life had not been easy for Zexion. For the first few years after losing Demyx he'd had to fight tooth and nail to keep his promise and stay alive. He had been like a blind man in a desert, wandering lost and aimless, searching for some kind of oasis.

But San Francisco was a beautiful city, and eventually he'd started to enjoy it. It became more than a place to be close to the ocean; it became his his home. And so he pulled himself from his crushing misery and crafted a purpose for his like, went to college and then medical school and dedicated himself to helping the sick get well. It seemed like a good way to keep Demyx close to him.

And some time in the middle of all of it, he realized he was happy.

At first he had felt guilty about this, being happy in a world in which Demyx didn't live, but eventually he realized it's what he would have wanted for him. Being happy was the only thing he could do for the man he loved, and so he was.

He stayed there by the lake until night fell over the city. He said goodbye to Dem and promised that he would visit again soon, then left to walk to the restaurant where he was meeting his friends for dinner.

* * *

Larxene, despite the wild days of her youth, had become quite the family woman in her own special way. Even after twenty years Zexion still felt the slightest shock at the sight of a wedding band on her finger. He'd never thought anyone could tame her, but Marluxia had done it, and they had a beautiful daughter whom he was proud to call his god child.

But her husband and daughter weren't there at the restaurant. It was just Larxene and Axel and Roxas waiting for him at their table in the back of the Olive Garden, the same one they sat at every time he came back to Chicago. It was kind of a tradition, a family reunion of sorts.

"Sorry I'm late." He said as he took his seat across from Axel.

"You're not _that _late. Actually, you're on time. But I guess that's late to you." said Axel.

"Well, you're here, so I sort of assumed I was behind."

"Touche, mon frere. But Roxy here keeps me punctual."

Roxas let out a derisive snort that made Zexion think this was either not the case or the bane of his existence. Getting Axel to do anything on time would certainly be a struggle.

It was good to see them, to talk with them and laugh with them. They talked about Axel's work in a local tattoo parlor, about Larxene's family, told jokes and shared memories. Sometimes it felt like he was married to his career, which didn't leave much room for a social life - and although he had friends in San Francisco, Larx and Axel and Roxas were like his family, and he always felt safe when he was with them. He was glad they had stayed in Chicago, because it made his visits there much more enjoyable.

"So, we have to get to the station now, right?" Larxene asked when they had finished their dinner.

"Yes." Zexion said. "My train leaves in an hour. But I told you, you don't have to - "

"Don't be ridiculous, of course I'm driving you. Besides, your luggage is already in my car."

"Really?"

"Yeah, Marly loaded it up while you were at the lake. We kind of figured we'd be low on time, because we usually are."

He nodded, hugged Axel and Roxas goodbye, and followed Larxene out tot he car. Just as she'd said, his suitcase and duffel bag were in the backseat.

Half way to the station, Larxene looked at him. He saw something like concern in her eyes. "You look really tired, Zexion. Are you alright?"

"I _am _tired. I work a lot. But that's all - I'm tired, but I'm happy."

"Are you? I do wish you'd find someone, at least to keep you company.."

"Larxene. I know you're well intentioned, but I'm not interested in finding anyone else. I had someone, and he's dead. I know it's been twenty years but I still love him as much as I did the day I lost him. It wouldn't be fair to another person. It wouldn't be fair to me. I'm as happy now as I'll ever be without him, and I don't want to mess with that."

She was quiet for a moment, then nodded."I understand."

They pulled into the station. He unloaded his luggage from the car. "Thanks for the ride. And for letting me crash on your couch, like always."

She hugged him. "Any time, Zex. You'll come back soon, won't you?"

"Of course. Of course I will."

* * *

The train was quiet as it rolled through the heart of the country. Everyone was asleep, everyone but Zexion - he had a headache that nothing could kill, and he was grateful for the silence. In the dead of night all he could hear was the steady clicking of the wheels against the tracks. He leaned his head against the window, stared out at the clear, bright stars and the fields of wheat. It was comforting, because it reminded him of hope.

_When I see you, I have hope._

Dem's dying words echoed inside of his skull. Even after all the time that had passed he could still hear his gentle voice so clearly, and the memory of it made him yearn to hear it again. It made long to look in those blue eyes and tell him he had it backwards; Demyx had been the one to give _him_hope. He told him this every night in his whispered prayers, but it wasn't the same. He wasn't even sure that his prayers were heard.

He sighed a little. He still wasn't sure about how much God cared for him - perhaps, he thought, God had created them and left them, or maybe he was dead. But he believed in Heaven. He had to.

The first light of dawn had just touched the sky when the pain hit him.

It started in his right shoulder and shot down to his wrist, like a bullet ricocheting inside of his arm, and spread to his chest. It was more intense than anything he'd ever felt, a terrible agony that took his breath away and made his vision swim.

He knew exactly what was happening to him. It was his job to know. His heart was seizing, giving out, too many years of working too hard, too much stress and too many drinks. All things considered, he wasn't completely surprised. He laid down, closed his eyes, and pressed his face into the seat.

He knew he could call for hep or scream, but he didn't want to. He didn't want to die surrounded by a crowd of strangers trying to save his tired heart. His life had been full and satisfying. He was ready. He wondered what would happen to him, where he would go. He felt no fear, only curiosity and a desire for the pain to be over.

"Zex." A voice said from above him. He recognized it immediately, and his eyes shot open.

And there, sitting in the seat opposite him, was Demyx. He looked so healthy and beautiful that Zexion felt tears well up and spill over. He'd missed him so incredibly much.

"D - dem..." He choked out.

An easy smile crossed Dem's lips. "Don't talk now. We have an eternity for that. So don't be afraid, don't worry. I'm here."

"We...will be...together?"

"Forever. That's a promise. I'm really proud of you, y'know that? I've been watching you this whole time, just like I said. I was always there. You did so well. You had me worried for a while there...but I knew you'd come out of it alright, and you did." His smile widened. "You're ready, huh?"

"Yeah...I'm...ready."

"Then let's ditch this place, you and me." He offered his hand. Zexion took it, and a moment later he was on the outside, looking down on his still, pale body. He felt free, liberated.

And together they rose above the train, above the fields of wheat and above the world, ready to meet eternity.


End file.
